A Fortunate Stroke Of Serendipity
by SpobyFicStalker
Summary: "The idea of failing at motherhood somehow scared her even more than the idea of failing at all other things." The story of Spencer and Toby's journey towards parenthood.
1. Chapter One

A/N: Hey, guys. Long time, no see?

For those of you who don't already know, I've completely let go of the show. I can't watch it anymore, and I can't reconcile the ship I see on it with the ship I fell in love with many moons ago. I honestly thought I'd never write Spoby again, but then I realized there's a part of their story I hadn't told yet. The Spoby in my head, I mean. Not the Spoby on the show. Heads up: none of the characters in this story are the ones that are now being portrayed on the show.

This story will be four chapters long, and has been on the surface of my mind for literal years. It might be my last story. It might not. I can't predict the future, and unfortunately, I can't make any promises.

Thank you for sticking with me. I wouldn't blame you if you didn't, but I can't express how much I've appreciated the support and for that I'll always be grateful.

* * *

 **A Fortunate Stroke Of Serendipity**

 _Chapter One: "We have a secret in our culture, and it's not that birth is painful. It's that women are strong." – Laura Stavoe Harm_

When Spencer was eight years old, she decided she was never having children.

Nothing about crying infants or stinky diapers appealed to her. Babies were gross, she concluded. They were noisy and they were gross, and she never wanted one in her house when she grew up.

When she announced her decision at dinner a few days later, her parents laughed. They said she was sure to feel differently when she was older. Before Spencer could open her mouth to protest, they had moved on to other things and were congratulating Melissa for making the honor roll.

And so, Spencer was left alone with her thoughts. Years passed, and her decision did not waver. What did change, very gradually, was the reason behind this vehement conviction. It was no longer because babies disgusted her. It was that parenthood didn't seem like something she'd be any good at. Small kids made her uncomfortable. She didn't know how to talk to them. She didn't know how to make them laugh. And worse of all, she didn't know how to ease their minds when they were hurt or afraid. Humans under the age of thirteen were a huge mystery to Spencer, and she found herself avoiding them at all costs.

The older she got, the more she realized her own upbringing probably had a lot to do with it. She would spend time at Hanna or Emily or Aria's house, and it could occur to her that if she had a mother like theirs she might feel differently. Spencer didn't know how to be a mom. She didn't know how to be nurturing. She wasn't sure if her own mother even knew.

The idea of failing at motherhood somehow scared her even more than the idea of failing at all other things.

When she was sixteen, she fell in love for the first and final time. It changed her. It smoothed out the chip on her shoulder. It shifted something inside her that never shifted back, and it made room for a depth of emotions she never thought she'd ever experience. Toby Cavanaugh was her polar opposite in some ways, and the other half of her soul in others.

But one thing he did not alter was the inability to see herself as a mother.

They grew together, Toby and her. They fought their hardships, and there were many. They made it through, bruised and battered but somehow still intact. They fled Rosewood – Spencer first, and Toby following her just a few weeks later once he got his affairs in order. They never looked back.

She did dorm rooms for a few years before assuring Toby that she'd had it with her college experience and begging him to let her move into his apartment with him. She did grad school. She thrived. She watched her boyfriend thrive with equal measure. Her life was finally going the way she wanted it to.

And still, her resolve did not falter.

She looked at Toby and felt immense guilt sometimes. She knew he would make an exceptional father. Her boyfriend wasn't much of a people person but he had a way with young children and animals that she could only dream of. All he had to do was smile and they had to be pried away from him by their parents and owners. Spencer would watch, feeling like an outsider, stuck between admiration and slight envy of this gift of his.

He knew of her reservations. He knew the thought of motherhood frightened her, and that the chances of her ever desiring it were very slim. He asked her to marry him anyway, but she had to make sure. She knew it was at the risk of losing him forever, but somehow the thought of him growing to resent her was even more unbearable.

His face contorted into something slightly painful when she hesitantly brought it up one night as they crawled in bed. He reached for her hand, deep in thought. He was formulating his response carefully in his head, she knew, and despite everything it made her smile slightly. He was so precise with his words. It was one of the many things she loved about him.

"I understand your reasons," was all he finally said, her heart sank a little.

"But you feel differently." It wasn't a question, and she wondered how these words were coming out of her mouth so calmly.

He shook his head in indecision, clasping her hand tighter in both of his. He met her eyes and she felt herself breathe a little easier when she saw the endless goodness in his baby blues.

"I want a life with you," he spoke quietly. "If that includes kids, great. But if doesn't… that's okay, too. You're still the one I want to be with, Spencer. I'd never want you to think you're not enough for me."

It brought her peace, his words. She didn't take for granted what an extraordinary thing it was to be given such freedom, and it made her feel invincible in some moments and grateful, oh so grateful, in others. And oddly enough, she caught herself wondering in the next few months. Just, theoretically, what a child of theirs might look like. Which name they would decide on. If it would be feisty like her or gentle like Toby.

Not long after they got married, her friend Hanna announced that she was pregnant. It shouldn't have come as a surprise. Unlike Spencer, Hanna had always known she was going to be a mom one day and had always been very open and straightforward about it. But somehow it caught Spencer off guard anyway. And over the months, Hanna got bigger. She had a glow that radiated off her, and Spencer honestly had never seen her friend happier.

Predictably, motherhood fit Hanna like a glove. It was very obvious from the day her daughter was born, and Spencer and Toby visited her in the hospital. Caleb seemed rather awkward and clumsy with their tiny newborn, but Hanna looked like she'd been doing this her entire life. She was the perfect combination of warm and caring but not overbearing in the slightest. In fact, she dumped the baby in Spencer's arms a mere five minutes after they'd arrived.

"Here. Hold her for me while I go pee."

And Spencer looked at the infant in her arms, flabbergasted and slightly uncomfortable until she saw Hanna's nose and chin. Caleb's dark eyes. Ashley's fiery red hair. And everything around her went quiet for a while.

To her own surprise, Spencer was unprepared when Hanna took the baby back, but she was even more unprepared for the abundance of feelings that would overflow her when her friend placed the child in Toby's arms instead. Her breath hitched, her heart skipped beat and then warmed up like a furnace then ached, so fiercely ached, because if she'd ever doubted it before it was crystal clear now that her husband was meant to be someone's father.

During the first year of Rylee's life, Spencer found herself making regular visits to the Rivers' home. She found herself taking interest in Hanna's new life. She didn't mind stories of breastfeeding and interrupted sleep. She found herself feeling genuine affection – love, even – for the tiny human her friend was raising. She had infinite respect and admiration for the grace in which Hanna handled the struggles, and even though she strongly felt she would never live up she found herself maybe wanting to try. Someday.

She couldn't bring herself to tell Toby until she was completely sure. It seemed cruel to have him get his hopes up only to have them crushed if it turned out she didn't want it after all. But over and over, it dawned on her that she wouldn't even be contemplating the option of children if he wasn't the one she was married to. Having children still didn't particularly appeal to her – it was having children with _him_ that did.

Hanna and Caleb threw a party for Rylee's first birthday, and Spencer made her decision as she watched the happy couple stare at their child lovingly as she tore into her birthday cake. She saw a different child, a different man, and herself… and suddenly it became something she desperately wanted.

"Just one," she begged Toby later that evening. "I can't promise I'll ever want more than one because… because if I suck at this at least I'll only mess up one. But I want it. I want to have a baby with you."

She couldn't get any more out because suddenly his arms were around her and he had lifted her off her feet and he was placing kiss after kiss against her lips and somehow they were both laughing.

Toby assured her that he wasn't in a rush but Spencer had been mulling it over in her head for so long that it strangely didn't make sense to hold off anymore, so they didn't. She never expected to conceive so soon, and the day her pregnancy test came back positive she nearly threw up just from the mere idea that in nine short months she would be someone's mom. Doubt clouded her joy more than she would have liked in that moment, until Toby came home and his blissful expression erased all her negativity.

They were going to be parents. As odd as it sounded to her own ears, she couldn't be happier.

* * *

Toby glanced at his wife while they were halted at a red light. She had barely spoken a word since they left the doctor's office. He'd watched her go pale at the newest revelation in their pregnancy. He'd felt the grip on his hand first tighten almost painfully and then lose all its firmness until it felt comatose, and he'd seen her eyes do the same: first widen with intensity and disbelief and then go dull. She'd smiled tightly when the doctor offered congratulations, and she hadn't made eye contact with anyone since.

She tensed when he reached out to place a comforting hand on her knee, and that unnerved him more than anything else. It was extremely rare that she rebuffed his affections, even or especially when she was hurt or confused or angry. He wanted so desperately for her to talk to him but he didn't quite know where to begin. It was all so unexpected. A few months ago he'd still been under the assumption that he'd probably never have even one child, and he'd made peace with that. And now…

They arrived home, and she went straight to the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water, which she downed in two seconds flat. She poured herself a second glass and it was then that Toby noticed her hands were shaking, and her breath seemed shallow and labored.

He frowned and stepped forward. "Spencer–"

"I can't do this." Her voice sounded raw and raspy, and she closed her eyes and shook her head rapidly. "I can't do it. I can't, I cant, I can't…"

Her voice hitched and her breaths came more rapidly and Toby's heart nearly broke in half because she hadn't had a panic attack in years and yet here she was, looking like she was about to die over something most people would call a miracle.

"Okay," he said quickly, reaching her in a few quick strides and closing his arms around her. He took deep breaths, hoping she would match her respiratory pattern to his, and pushed her hair away from her clammy forehead. "It's okay. Breathe, Spence. Breathe."

"I can't do this," she choked again, her fingers digging into his sides sharply, and all he could do was answer with, "Sh. Breathe."

She looked a little better within a few minutes and he poured her another glass of water, which she took her time with this time. Toby took in her appearance. She looked – for lack of a better word – disheveled. Exhausted, numb and emotionally drained. And still so beautiful that it made every part of his body ache.

"We'll get through this," he assured her quietly, hoping irrationally that his words would fix everything. "We'll make it work, I promise. We'll find a way."

She seemed almost angry now. "What if I can't?"

"You can." His hands reached out to rub her shoulders but she batted them away.

"It wasn't supposed to go like this," she blurted out with clear frustration in her voice, and Toby would have smiled at the control freak in her if the circumstances were different. "One, remember? That's what we agreed on. I don't even know if I'd be any good with one. I don't know if…" She shook her head and ran a hand through her hair agitatedly, and he wished the crazed look in her eyes didn't scare him so much. "Now I'm going to fuck up three lives, Toby."

He flinched. He'd heard her talk like this once before, but amidst the blind delight of her wanting a child with him after all he'd let it pass. He kicked himself for it now. When his wife said these things, it was always for a reason. It was never in the drama of the moment; it was because she truly felt that way, and he knew better than to overlook it.

"No, you're not," he spoke calmly, trying to keep the dull pain out of his voice. "It'll be hard but you'll get the hang of it. _We'll_ get the hang of it."

" _You_ will," she fired back. "I won't. I can barely picture myself with one kid but three? And what about money?" she rambled on before he could get a word in. "How are we going to financially support three children?"

"Don't worry about that," he pleaded with her. "I'll look into it. I'll make something work."

"Fuck that," she snapped. "Don't act like the male patriarch who handles the finances and tells his wife not her break her pretty little head over it. That's insulting. It's not me, and if you don't know that about me you don't know me at all."

He knew she was lashing out because she was on edge and upset, but he wasn't going to pretend her words didn't sting. Once upon a time he might have let his hurt feelings cloud his judgment but now he looked at her lost expression and all he could do was rub his face and say desperately, "I'm sorry."

To his consternation, she burst into tears. "No, _I'm_ sorry! I've been a complete bitch about this. You're probably excited to have three and all I've done is bitch and complain and rain on your parade."

"Okay," he said again, gathering her into his arms and somewhat to his surprise she let him. "Let it out, babe. Let it out."

Her own arms came around his back and he felt her bury her nose in his neck. Her next words were muffled and pitiful. "I'm so scared of disappointing you."

His grip on her tightened protectively, and he pulled back just barely enough to press a long kiss against her forehead. "I'm not worried," he spoke finally. "I know you. You're going to love these kids something fierce."

"But what if I make all the wrong decisions for them?"

He wiped the wetness from underneath her eyes with his thumbs, trying to keep his voice gentle. "You _will_ make some wrong decisions for them. So will I. We're not going to get everything right, Spence. But these are our children, and we're going to try our very best for them. And you're not in this alone." He trailed one thumb down her cheek. "If we fuck up, we fuck up together."

She was quiet for a moment, and he thought he might have gotten through to her only to see a last flicker of hesitation cross her features.

"You had such a good mom," she said quietly, and so tentatively that he wondered where she was going with this. "I guess… I guess I'm scared I'll never compare."

He felt a sharp stab at his chest, almost like the point of a knife. "Oh, honey…" He took her back in his arms and sighed, whispering his words against her ear. "You're not my mom. I'd never expect you to be my mom. I want you to be _you_. I want you to figure about how to be the mom _you_ want to be."

She was quiet after that, and he kept a close eye on her over the next few days. She seemed more peaceful than when she'd first found out about the three babies growing inside her, but her enthusiasm was still halfhearted at best. Toby certainly had is own moments of doubt. They looked over their finances together and could only conclude that it wasn't going to be easy. When he offered to work more hours her eyes welled up with tears, which she then quickly blamed on pregnancy hormones. He wasn't fooled. He knew that the last thing she wanted was to spend more time apart, and to be stuck at home with three small children while her husband was at work all the time.

Toby had never been a particularly jittery person but then again, few things had given him more anxiety in his life than the health risks this pregnancy entailed for Spencer. The thought of her little body having to carry three babies to term stressed him out to no end. He was told by doctors, friends and the internet that healthy triplets were born all the time and that they just had to monitor the pregnancy very closely, but none of these facts completely eased his worries. He caught himself staring at his wife sometimes in an otherwise insignificant moment and wishing he could carry those kids for her.

But he was also, undeniably, excited. The thought of having three kids, all the same age, was overwhelming to say the least but it was also thrilling and exhilarating and Toby could not wait to meet them, hold them, have long conversations with them. He would be cuddling with Spencer in bed or on the couch and he would feel the movement inside her body, and his heart would ache in the best possible way because those were his children in there. The awe on Spencer's face when this happened didn't escape him, either.

Little by little, she seemed to adapt and adjust. He could tell she loved all three of these little beings already and that despite all her worries and fears, the idea of having just one was unfathomable to her now. There was still a slight possibility that one of the babies might succumb in-utero, and every time the doctors mentioned this Toby could physically feel her fear in the grip of her dainty hand. She might not have wanted multiple babies, and the idea still scared her and made her doubt herself in some pretty ugly ways, but that clearly hadn't stopped her from getting attached to all three just the same. There was no doubt in Toby's mind that as a mother, she would be a lioness.

Their discussion on whether or not to find out the genders was short lived. Toby thought it might be fun to wait and be surprised when they were born, but Spencer laughed in his face.

"Forget it. I need to plan for this. I need to know exactly what I'm getting into."

He accepted the fact that meticulous preparation was her answer to everything that scared her. The more she could find out about the tiny lives growing inside her, the better she would feel equipped to handle it. If he asked her to hold off finding out what genders she was carrying, he might as well sign her death sentence.

She expressed insecurity over the fact that she couldn't just feel it the way Hanna had claimed she could. Hanna had been convinced from day one that she was having a girl, and when her daughter proved her right she'd raved about motherly intuition to anyone who would listen. It seemed Spencer felt incompetent in that area already when she confessed to him that she had no idea.

"To be honest, I'm kind of hoping they're all boys," she told him one night as they cleaned up the kitchen. Her tone was light and almost joking, yet Toby could sense an underlying truth to her words.

He looked at her in surprise. "Why?"

She shrugged, placing a few plates in the dishwasher. "I feel like I could handle boys. Probably because I have this idea in my head that they'd be like you," she admitted after a moment. "But girls? I guess one wouldn't be too bad, but multiple girls? Sisters?" She shuddered at the thought. "Things get ugly between sisters."

"That doesn't have to be true," he argued. "Just because you had a bad experience with yours doesn't mean it has to be that way for our kids."

She wasn't convinced. "Think about it. They're going to be the exact same age, Toby. People are going to compare them whether we like it or not. They'd just end up hating each other."

The notion that she would think that troubled him, but she was so set in her conviction that he knew he wouldn't be able to talk her out of this one. He found himself hoping for at least two boys as well, if only to ease her mind a little. He didn't really care either way but she deserved to have one thing go her way in this pregnancy.

Fate was not so kind, and Toby was back to wrapping his arms around her and all but imploring her to have a little faith.

* * *

When she entered the house, Toby greeted her at the door with a hug and a kiss.

"Come here," he said with a gentle tug on her hand. "I have a surprise for you."

"Wait," she laughed, stopping him in the middle of the hall. "I have to pee first. These babies think my bladder is a trampoline."

She sensed his eyes on her as she stepped away, and she didn't know whether to feel self-conscious or flattered. "I know. I'm huge."

He shook his head. "No, Spence. You're beautiful."

Flattered, it was. When she returned he took her upstairs in the direction of the nursery, and when they entered the room her jaw dropped because before her stood three finely crafted cribs. For a second she thought he must have gone out and purchased them, but when she took a closer look she knew differently. She would recognize his craftsmanship anywhere.

"When did you do this?" she breathed, and her heart melted at the pride she saw in his eyes.

"I started the first one right when we started trying, and when we found out we were having two more than expected…" He shrugged. "I built two more."

Her hand slid over the soft material of the wood, and when she took notice of the detailing a lump rose in her throat. He'd told her from that start that he was going to build their baby's crib, but when they found out they were having three it hadn't even occurred to her that he'd take the time and the effort to fulfill his promise threefold.

"Toby…" She cleared her throat and turned to look at him. "They're beautiful. Thank you."

He took a few steps towards her, letting his hands roam her baby bump. "They're my kids, too," he teased her lightly. "You don't have to thank me for doing stuff for my own kids."

It dawned on Spencer that when she was little, her father would occasionally take her and Melissa out for ice cream, probably so her mother could get some work done. And when they returned, her mother would always thank him.

She never realized this might be absurd, but Toby made her see things differently. Why had her mother thanked her father for doing something for his own children? Reflecting on this caused another thought to suddenly rise to the surface of her consciousness, and she looked up into her husband's eyes.

She couldn't predict in how many ways she would fail her children. On good days, she questioned whether she would have any patience with them at all. On bad, she threw up her meals and blamed it on morning sickness even though she was well past her first trimester. But one thing she knew for sure. One thing she knew she had gotten irreversibly right, and she had already given them the very best of.

Spencer had chosen their father. That was a choice she knew her kids would benefit from during their first breath and their last breath and everything that came in between.

A few days later, she spent the afternoon with Hanna and Rylee. It was nice out, and they settled in the backyard and watched the now 20-month-old toddle around on the grass.

"There's nothing like the love you feel for your child, Spence," Hanna spoke up suddenly, her eyes following her daughter's movements as she chased a butterfly. "You'll see. You can't know until you've experienced it."

Spencer didn't say anything, but a sense of gloom washed over her. It felt like a great deal of pressure to have to love something that much. Especially since she felt like she already knew the kind of love that Hanna was talking about. The kind of love that warmed her from the inside out, and consumed her entire existence to the point that she no longer knew who she was without it. She already felt it, every day, for the man whose arms she slept in. She couldn't imagine ever loving anyone as much as she loved him.

She worried that parenthood would change them. She'd carefully observed how it changed Hanna and Caleb. Not necessarily for the worse, she supposed. It was very clear they were still a team and that nothing would ever come between them, but they were a slightly different couple than they were two years ago. So much of their lives revolved around their child. They had always been the couple that was the most elaborate in their public displays of affection – holding hands and being cutesy to the point that it made Spencer roll her eyes at times – and now so much of that was lost because they were so wrapped up in making sure their daughter was safe, warm, fed, comfortable and happy. Hanna and Caleb had always bickered, but now so much of their bickering was over the wellbeing of the child they both loved so deeply.

"Our sex life is pretty pathetic right now," Hanna had even confessed, months ago. "Oh well. We're too exhausted to have sex anyway."

It had scared Spencer then, and it scared her again as she thought back to it now. She needed sex. With Toby. She needed the physical release it gave her, and she needed the sanctuary of curling up in his embrace afterwards. She grew cranky without it. She felt like she was being deprived of something essential when too much time passed without feeling his bare skin on hers. Even now that she had three lives growing inside her and felt like a beached whale, it hadn't stopped them. But would the burden and fatigue and burnout of raising children cause them to drift apart physically if not emotionally?

The babies grew. Her worries did not stop them. Spencer was grateful when the OB/GYN informed them that all three were not only healthy but also positioned correctly for a vaginal birth. She almost couldn't believe her ears, because at this point she was so used to this pregnancy throwing her for a loop that she'd already mentally prepared herself for a C-section.

"Do you know what the chances are of naturally conceiving triplets?" Spencer asked her husband one night as he laid against her when she couldn't sleep, his hand slowly running back and forth across her belly. It was nearly 2 a.m. and Toby had offered to make her tea but she declined, wanting his warm body beside her more than any hot drink.

He hoisted himself up on one elbow and looked at her expectantly, and she informed him, "I looked it up. 8,100 to one."

Toby nodded, and it puzzled her how she saw his mouth twitch noticeably before he clearly tried to keep a straight face.

"What's so funny?" she wanted to know, reaching out to push his hair out of his eyes. He tried to hide it from her but in end the succumbed to his obvious hilarity and cracked up, leaving her perplexed.

"8,100 to one?" he questioned finally, through his hearty laughter. "Are you serious? We're ridiculous, Spencer. This could only happen to us."

And suddenly she was laughing, too, clutching her stomach and wiping tears of merriment from her eyes. They both laughed till it wore them out, and when most of their amusement eventually passed she wondered if she had ever loved him as much as she did in this very moment.

They argued for weeks and weeks over names, until they finally settled on three that they both fell in love with. They kept the names a secret from their friends and family – much to Hanna's chagrin, who hadn't been able to stop herself from spilling her own daughter's name long before the actual birth. They painted the nursery together, and read up on things like breastfeeding and vaccinations and parenting techniques together. With all her doctors' warnings of the likelihood of a premature birth with multiples, Spencer had her overnight bag packed at twenty-eight weeks.

But the babies stayed put, and before she knew it she was at thirty-five. She didn't think she'd ever been so miserable, physically speaking, in her whole life. She felt like the size of a building, she had awful insomnia, she experienced back pain and leg cramps and headaches, she had shortness of breath, her feet were so swollen that all she could tolerate were flip flops and she couldn't go half an hour without having to pee. Rationally, she knew it was in the best interest of these kids to stay with her for as long as her body would allow it. She felt like a terrible mother already for wishing at times that they would just come out and put her out of her misery, and she didn't share these thoughts with anyone.

It finally became too much one evening as she was making herself some tea while Toby put the final touches on the nursery. She felt like she hadn't gotten a decent night's sleep in ages and she'd had terrible heartburn all day, and when the teapot leaked and tea spilled all over the counter it was the last straw. Tears of frustration fell from her eyes as she mopped up the mess, and soon they were coming with such a vigor that her vision went blurry.

"What's wrong?"

Toby's sudden presence in the kitchen startled her, and she quickly fought for her composure. "Nothing," she said quickly, turning away from him and furiously wiping at her face.

He came closer and his hands settled on her shoulders before sliding down her arms and across her protruding stomach, his body covering hers from behind. He pushed his face into her neck and breathed her in. Biting her lip, she closed her eyes to prevent more tears from falling.

"Tell me," he whispered against her.

She couldn't. She couldn't tell him how fucking sick she was of being pregnant when she'd signed up to carry these babies for forty weeks and yet here she was, ready to throw in the towel at only thirty-five. It made her sick inside to think of how selfish she was, and so she uttered the only words she could muster. "I'm so sorry…"

He didn't ask what for. Instead, he kissed her cheek before turning her around and tilting her chin towards him. "Are you kidding?" he spoke gently. "It's unreal what a trooper you've been these last few weeks. These babies are basically parasites to your body and you haven't complained once."

Hearing him refer to their children as parasites made her chuckle unexpectedly, and she hesitantly tried out her own bout of dry humor. "No, I cry over spilled tea instead."

"You're entitled to a little neurosis," he assured her teasingly, before turning serious. "Spencer. There are three growing babies inside your body. I don't know anyone who could pull that off with so much dignity, and there isn't a second that goes by that you don't amaze me."

His words made her tears return with a vengeance, and she reached out to wrap her arms around his neck. But instead of the comfort of his embrace, all she felt her massive stomach bump against him, and her arms fell short – literally – and in a flash the frustration was back.

"I can't even hug you," she cried, but before she had time to dwell on the devastation of this discovery Toby was guiding her to the couch. He sat down before holding his hand out to her, and when she lowered herself beside him she was immensely relieved to find she still fit underneath his arm. Her heartbeat gradually slowed as she rested against his chest, and when she felt completely calm as she looked up at Toby only to find him gazing at her with wonder and devotion in his eyes. Her hand went up to his hair and she pulled his mouth down to hers.

She carried her children for another two weeks, until her body called it quits or the babies called it quits – she wasn't quite sure. Toby took her to the hospital, calm and supportive as always, and held her hand throughout the long and utmost painful journey of their kids fighting their way out of her body and into the world of the living.

Their son came first, and they named him Lawrence Tobias. Seven minutes later there was a daughter, Cleo Marion. Thirty-four minutes after that, another daughter, Eloise Jill.

And just like that, Spencer was a mother.


	2. Chapter Two

A/N: I really can't thank you all enough for the amazing feedback on the last chapter. I don't do this for the reviews, and I try not to depend on them too much because it isn't about that for me, but in a way that makes each and every one even more special. So from the bottom of my heart: thank you – for reading, reviewing, following, favoriting and still being interested in the first place. I'm very grateful to all of you. :)

* * *

 _Chapter Two: "There's no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one." – Jill Churchill  
_  
Watching Spencer go through labor and delivery had to be one of the most torturous experiences of Toby's life.

As if the final weeks of her pregnancy hadn't been enough, he thought miserably. It had been painfully obvious to everyone with eyes how uncomfortable she was, yet with the exception of that one night he found her crying in the kitchen she'd taken it like a champ. Caleb had warned him there would be a lot of moaning and whining and sobbing in the final trimester, but Spencer hadn't done any of that. Every single fucking day, Toby had been floored by her steely perseverance.

It always played in the back of his mind that he had done this to her. He had put these babies inside her, despite the fact that it was something they both wanted. The slight, irrational guilt he felt over this suddenly exploded when he saw her on the delivery table. The helplessness he felt as she watched her in excruciating pain felt eerily familiar, and it didn't take him long to remember how things had been when she was in high school. How she was knocked down over and over again, and he'd been forced to stand by as she suffered, and how it had eventually led him to do things that, to this day, he still couldn't quite comprehend.

In between Cleo and Eloise, he looked down at her limp, worn out body and drained eyes, and thought sardonically that it was for the best that they'd conceived three kids at once. There was no way he'd sign up for putting his wife through this again. His psyche simply couldn't take it.

He squeezed her hand as she pushed one last time, and then it was all over. They had three healthy, beyond perfect babies. She had grown every inch of them, and had somehow held all three of them inside her until they were good and ready to come out. If Toby didn't know it before, he certainly knew now – he was married to the single most amazing person in the world.

"They're so beautiful," Spencer breathed as the two of them sat next to each other in her hospital bed, their three babies spread out over both their laps. She gently readjusted the hat on Lawrence's head before adding softly, "I didn't expect them to be so beautiful."

And they were. Three exquisite little faces with flawless features, from their eyes to their noses to their lips. He could not fathom that he had Spencer had created these three tiny beings out of nothing. He certainly couldn't comprehend that if they hadn't had sex that night, for whatever reason, they wouldn't exist. They were only a few hours old, and already Toby could not imagine his life without them.

In the years to come, their friends and family would often ask at what point they had started to see their children's very different personalities shine though. They would look at each other, and their answer was always the same.

From day one.

Lawrence was perhaps the easiest baby out of the three. He was cheerful and charming and easygoing, always in exceptionally high spirits at the sight of food. There was not a thing in the world this kid wouldn't happily eat. Lawrence was a kid that won everyone over. He smiled spontaneously at the sight of anything and anyone, from parents to friends to strangers, and the dimple in his cheek melted hearts of all ages. He slept through the night at a mere six weeks, rarely cried and was right on target with all his developmental milestones. Needless to say, he didn't give his parents much trouble. When Toby first found out he was having a son, he'd been determined to support his boy's interests no matter what they were. It still hurt to look back on his own childhood and realize his father had been thoroughly disappointed at having a kid who read all day, and who spent hours drawing or listening to his mother play the piano. Toby swore he wouldn't do that to his own children, and that if his son wanted to take ballet or play the harp he would stand behind whatever less than conventional choice he made. But as it turned out, his resolve was unnecessary. Unlike his father, Lawrence was an almost stereotypical example of a little boy. He was fascinated by balls, insects and anything that had wheels before he was even a year old, wouldn't touch anything pink and although he enjoyed the occasional tea party with his sisters, he got them to play with his train set just as often. And so, Toby humorously prepared himself for a lot of ball games and monster truck rallies instead. He wasn't sure how a combination of his and Spencer's genes had produced this human being, but he wasn't complaining. He wouldn't want a different boy for the world.

Cleo was a spitfire from the very beginning. Even as a newborn, she had an inane sense of alertness and determination in her wide eyes – a look Toby recognized with great amusement, and he knew in his gut that this was the kid that had the most of Spencer in her. She was the first out of their three to crawl and later to walk, and her mobility was a challenge that neither of her parents had foreseen. Not only was this child fearless and exceptionally independent, she also had to be the most curious creature Toby had ever encountered in his life. She opened drawers and crawled into tiny spaces and nearly gave her parents a heart attack on more than one occasion when they suddenly couldn't find her. She pulled pots and pans out of the shelves, was drawn to electrical outlets and didn't take well to being told no. She was fully potty trained and spoke in sentences by the time she was two, and what came out of her mouth was nothing short of hilarious. By the time she was three and a half, she refused to wear anything her parents laid out for her and insisted on putting her own outfits together instead, which she did with determined consideration. Not much later, she all but demanded Toby take the training wheels off her bike, and to both his and Spencer's utter disbelief she rode her two-wheeler nearly perfectly from her very first try. She was spirited and caring, excelled at a wide variety of things and was a natural born leader. Toby watched with a mixture of pride and unease as Cleo grew into this role even with her own siblings – pride because she was so extraordinary, and unease because his whole life he'd watched other people depend on his wife until the pressure she put on herself was unbearable, and it was not something he wished on his young daughter.

From the day she was born, Eloise was a sensitive little thing that picked up on every nuance. He'd read somewhere that some newborns recognized their mother's bodies from when they were in the womb, and he figured his lastborn had to be one of those babies because there were times during her first weeks of life that only Spencer could soothe her. She developed extreme stranger anxiety around the age of six months, and remained significantly attached to both her parents long after this phase was supposed to have passed. Loud noises that didn't seem to bother her siblings made Eloise cry, from the vacuum to the blender to the lawnmower. She barely lasted a minute into her first fireworks on the Fourth of July before Toby had to take her home. He knew Spencer often worried about her – even more so when the kids celebrated their second birthday and Eloise still barely spoke a word. Spencer's parents didn't help matters by insisting they get her tested for delays, and Toby knew they meant well but his wife was furious with them anyway and then furious with herself for letting them get to her. He knew she feared that her parents didn't see what was so evident to the both of them: that Eloise had so many wonderful qualities. She had a sweetness about her that all but brought him to his knees. She was content to sit in his lap for hours, her thumb in her mouth, her little head resting back against his chest. She exuded an aura of innocence that made his every protective instinct come alive, but at the same time he knew she wasn't as fragile as she seemed. There was an unmistakable intelligence in her gaze that let them know she would get where she needed to be at her own pace.

And then, there was Spencer. Truly, it was nothing short of remarkable to watch her effortlessly transform into their children's mother from the second they were born. He knew she probably didn't see it but as their father, Toby could only be in awe of the downright instinctive knowledge she had of what they needed – whether they were hot, cold, hungry, sick or simply wanted to be held. He trusted her instincts implicitly and with good reason, for they never let them down.

Being parents to three young children was the hardest thing either of them had ever experienced but it was also one of the most rewarding, as banal as that sounded. One evening, just a few weeks after they brought the kids home from the hospital, he'd finished putting both girls down for the night and went to see how Spencer was doing with Lawrence. He found her changing the baby's diaper (with great amusement and not for the first time, the thought popped in his head that only Spencer would insist on cloth diapering with triplets). She was singing to him softly in her deep, husky voice, absentmindedly missing a few beats as she searched for the wipes and smiling down at the little boy when he gurgled. Toby's breath stalled in his throat as he hid behind the doorway unnoticed, listening to her raspy melody as it carried across the room. It was the single most beautiful sight he'd ever seen in his life, and love for his wife and their children overwhelmed him to the point that he could barely see straight.

She only realized his presence when she was done and had picked the baby up to hold him against her chest, and Toby's face must have spoken volumes because she looked at him questioningly. "What?"

He took a step inside and cleared his throat. "How did you think you wouldn't be any good at this?"

This pleased her, he could tell, but she was still Spencer. She snorted. "Please. I knew it would be hard but I never imagined it'd be _this_ hard."

"But you're doing it," he told her, coming to stand in front of her. "You and me together. We're meeting the physical and emotional needs of three babies, and honest to God, Spence, sometimes you even make it look easy."

"Nothing about this is easy," she protested. "Except loving them. That's so much easier than I thought it would be, and I don't get it because… all they do is sleep and eat and poop and cry but I swear, if someone tried to take them from me I'd either kill them or die trying."

He grinned, pressing a kiss to her forehead and then to the top of their son's head. "I believe you."

"I thought I could never love anyone more than you," she went on softly. "And I don't. I never could. But…"

"As much?" he suggested gently, because he easily related to everything she was saying.

She nodded. "Even that is incomprehensible to me. That I could love three other people as much as I love you. I didn't know I had that much love in me."

Over the years, her role as a mother only intensified. She had a natural authority with her kids that most parents could only dream of and her parenting style was extremely no nonsense, but at the same time it was compassionate and imaginative and, above all, wildly supportive and carefully protective. His wife was a Mama Bear if he ever saw one. Her claws came out the second she sensed injustice for any of her children, and Toby almost pitied the fool who ever attempted to lay a wrong hand on them. She smoothed back their hair and kissed their cheeks in gestures that he wasn't sure she realized were so instinctively motherly. She put on magic tricks for them, making their eyes sparkle in awe and delight, and Toby wasn't sure she even noticed the way her children looked at her. When Cleo broke her arm and Eloise cracked her head open and Lawrence pushed a pebble so far up his nose that they were at a loss on how to get it out, she was the one who rushed them to the ER while Toby stayed behind with the other two. Amidst the chaos he would volunteer go in her place, but it was no surprise to him that his offer was shot down every time. He was just as worried as she was and he wanted to be with their suffering child just as much as she did, but he knew that he handled uncertainty and waiting better than his wife. Asking her to sit back while one of her babies was in pain was the equivalent of asking her to set herself on fire.

Toby supposed it would have been all too easy for him and Spencer to lose touch with each other while attempting to bring up three humans. Their kids seemed better behaved than most, if he did say so himself, but even then they soaked up more time and energy than he ever would have thought possible. And somehow, it was always Spencer who realized first when the two of them were slipping.

Every now and then, she would come to him after the kids were in bed and nestle herself into his arms. She would hold him close and linger longer than usual, and eventually whisper, "I miss you."

And his throat would close up because she knew how to identify and express the things that he didn't. It was only when he heard those three simple words out of her mouth that the extent of his own struggle hit him – the struggle that, if he didn't get enough time with her, it felt like his world was falling apart. Maybe the sole reason they never had any marital issues was that Spencer tugged on the alarm bell sooner than most.

There were days when her past caught up with her, even after she became a mother. Days when she flinched when her phone went off, days when she would randomly starting checking if all the windows and doors were locked while their unsuspecting children played innocently in their home.

Lawrence entered his prankster stage when he was about three (a phase he would never quite grow out of), and he learned the hard way that his tricks didn't always have the desired effect on his mother. He scared the shit out of her one evening, simply by sneaking up on her in a dark hallway upstairs and roaring as loudly as he could as he grabbed her by the waist. Toby saw it happen, saw Spencer jump as a terrified noise escaped her throat and saw how her eyes closed when she saw that the culprit was no other than their preschool aged son. Unfortunately, it was too late. She had been rattled to the very core, and Toby saw her fight tears before fleeing into a nearby bedroom and missing the way Lawrence's delighted hilarity turned into hurt and confusion upon seeing his mother's reaction.

Before he went after her, Toby took his son aside and explained as gently as he could that Mommy wasn't the best person to try his pranks on.

"Why?" the boy questioned, looking heartbroken at the idea of not being able to include his mother in his new hobby.

Knowing his children were far too young to understand the origins and complexities behind Spencer's uphill battle with anxiety, Toby kept it simple. "Some people don't like to be scared, bubba. Your mom is one of them."

It wouldn't be the last time their children felt the aftermath of their mother's torturous past (or their father's, for that matter). Just a few months later he came home from work, smiling to himself as he hung up his jacket and listened to his children's voices in the background, Cleo's in particular, taking the lead as always. But then he noticed his other daughter standing beside the doorway that led to the living room, her back against the wall, her clear blue eyes wide and expressive. He hadn't heard her approach, and something stopped him from greeting her warmly and going to pick her up like he usually would.

They regarded each other, Eloise and him, and a wave of understanding passed between them. He knelt down and she came to him, fitting between his legs and placing her soft, baby arms around his neck.

"Mommy needs your hug," she whispered in his ear.

He held her tighter. "What?"

"Mommy's sad today. She needs your hug."

Toby carefully pulled back to look her in the eye, his hands gently resting at her ribcage. At four years old, this child had an intuition that put most adults to shame. Never in his life did Toby imagine he'd encounter another human being who sensed Spencer's moods the way he did, but that was until Eloise came along.

He looked into her anxious little face and nodded. "Okay, peanut. I've got it, don't worry."

He greeted his other kids first, cuddled and kissed them, asked them about their day and spent a few minutes listening so he could give his wife his full attention as soon as they were talked out. Then he redirected Eloise into their play and headed towards Spencer in the kitchen, approaching slowly, taking in what he could. At first glance, she seemed fine. She moved briskly and deliberately as she prepared dinner, always graceful in a way that made his fingers and toes tingle. But then he noticed how her shoulders seemed tense, her face not as vibrant as usual and her eyes haunted… and he knew his daughter had been spot on.

"Hey, baby," he murmured, and when she saw him she smiled – not an overly bright smile, but a real smile nonetheless. Their arms wove around each other, and his lips brushed against her hair and then her own lips when she tilted her mouth up to his.

She pried herself loose to tend to the stove, avoiding his eyes as she asked him, "How was work?"

He recognized her attempt to deflect from a mile away but he played along, answering truthfully. "Good. What about you? How was your day?"

She opened her mouth to reply, then shrugged and shook her head. He saw her swallow, and he reached out to place a single strand of hair behind her ear. "Not great?" he prodded gently.

She bit her lip and nodded in confirmation. He waited patiently for her to elaborate, and when she didn't he asked, "Did anything happen?"

He noticed how she cringed, and it pained him. That was the hardest part for her, or at least the hardest part for her to admit to – the fact that nothing out of the ordinary had to happen for her to have a bad day. Anxiety and awful memories would sneak up on her unprompted and untriggered, as if her psyche wanted to punish her every once in a while. Punish her for daring to recover from the hellacious years that plagued her high school experience. Punish her for finding bliss in marriage, joy in motherhood and fulfillment in her job.

"Come here." He tugged on her elbow and she came without protest, burrowing into him. He kissed her shoulder and stroked her back, and when the food hissed on the stove he tended to it with one hand while still holding her against him with the other.

She looked better when she called the kids to the table a while later, he noted. Her shoulders were more relaxed and her expression wasn't as grim. While Cleo took it upon herself to pour everyone's drinks and Lawrence raced to the bathroom before settling down at the table, Eloise sat quietly as her eyes tentatively trailed across every inch of her mother's face. She must have approved of what she saw because she gave her father a small smile, and Toby responded with a reassuring wink.

* * *

It took enrolling the kids in kindergarten for Spencer to come to terms with the fact that they weren't babies anymore. Apparently their fifth birthday wasn't proof enough. Neither was the fact that they could all tie their own shoes and make their own beds.

It broke her heart to think of those three chubby babies that didn't exist anymore. Instead stood three actual articulate humans with preferences and opinions. It made her want to sob, but at the same time it made her undeniably excited for their future. For seeing them grow still, for seeing them develop into functioning members of society. She didn't understand how something could simultaneously devastate and delight her so profoundly.

Not that there weren't a few minor bumps along the road. The latest was a series of nightmares for Cleo that caused her to wake up in tears multiple times a week. Their typically self-sufficient and put together five-year-old would be a wreck, and some nights it was so bad that they allowed her in bed with them. It was something Spencer swore before becoming a parent that she would never do, and something she tried, to this day, to avoid. As much as she loved her children – and she did, more than words – she didn't want them in her bed. At least not before 7:00 a.m. She wanted that time alone with Toby, even when it was to do nothing more than snuggle up to him and sleep. She missed him when there was a body between them, no matter how tiny that body was.

But when her daughter woke up in a frenzy and nothing would calm her, Spencer's own needs paled. So did Toby's, she knew. He was usually the one to get up when they heard their child crying, half jokingly insisting he was the family nightmare expert. Spencer would smile humorlessly, knowing he had enough experience with her own nightmares to write a fucking book. Most of the time he would return with reassuring words and promises that their daughter was fast asleep once again, but it happened that he would stay away longer than usual and eventually reappear with Cleo in his arms. Spencer would kiss her tear-stained cheek, exchange a loaded look with her husband and silently agree they weren't sending her back to her bed tonight.

All the books told her it was a phase and it would pass, but Spencer remained uneasy until one, two and finally three weeks passed without a single incident. When she asked her daughter about it, her brave little Cleo answered, "It's okay, Mommy. The monsters went away."

And that was the end of it.

It was almost funny how parenthood had brought a whole bunch of worries and troubles with it that Spencer hadn't even thought to consider before her children arrived – but on the other hand, it was just as ironic that many of the things she _had_ obsessed over turned out to be futile. The relationship between herself and Toby was one; the relationship between their two daughters was another.

Spencer looked at them one day from where she sat perched on the porch swing (another one of Toby's creations), watching them play with their jump rope while their brother was away at a birthday party. They'd tied one end around a tree, and were taking turns jumping while the other turned the rope. They recited rhymes that Spencer recognized from her own childhood, giggled, lived in their own little world. And Spencer only realized her eyes had glazed over with tears when Toby sat next to her, pushing a mug of hot tea in her hands.

His own eyes widened when he saw her. "What's wrong?"

She smiled, giving his knee a comforting squeeze. "Nothing. I just…" Her gaze returned to the two little girls in the front yard. "I never had that. What they have. My sister and I… we never played together like that."

"When you were their age your sister was practically a teenager, Spencer," he pointed out gently.

But she shook her head. "Still. It was never like that for us. We never had that bond. I guess my parents kind of made sure we didn't," she muttered after a short pause.

She thought of her own daughters and felt sick at the notion that they, as their parents, could have permanently tainted everything that made their relationship unique. From the moment they were born, Cleo and Eloise had been a part of something that was very much their own. They loved their brother, too, and they each had a very special, very specific relationship with him, too – but something about the connection between the two girls had always been out of this world. They calmed each other. They brought the best out in each other. When one hurt, the other hurt more. And yes, they argued from time to time. Cleo was extremely strong-willed and Eloise could be surprisingly stubborn when backed into a corner, but at the end of the day they were inseparable and that was something Spencer hadn't counted on. She would have considered them merely tolerating each other a success.

She felt a strong arm wrap around her, and she sighed contentedly as she leaned against her husband in the early evening air.

"Neither your parents nor mine handled multiple children very well," he commented dryly, and she shot him a sharp look because the latter was a gross understatement. "Don't you love when we get things right that our parents didn't?"

She snorted, but his sense of humor didn't escape her. "I'm sure we'll mess up other things for them, though."

"Eh…" Toby shrugged, and she looked at him only to notice he didn't seem too worried. "Let them fix it with their own kids then."

She swatted his hand but couldn't contain a smirk. "You're awful. And also, _ugh_ at them having their own kids. Why would you say that? I'm still adjusting to the idea that they're not in diapers anymore."

Toby chuckled and kissed her temple, and both sets of eyes returned to their two little girls. The truth was that having multiple children was an unexpected blessing that Spencer was thankful for every day. Not only did she adore their bond with each other, she also found that their differences made her appreciate them more. All three of her kids were so wildly different, and it allowed her to love different things about them. Their dissimilarities shone through with everything they did, and it was captivating to Spencer. All of them came from the same two sets of genes and were being raised by the same two people, yet even the way she and Toby woke them up in the morning was specified to each child.

Cleo was a morning person, like her mother, and by far the easiest to get out of bed. All they had to do was kiss her, murmur a soft morning greeting and this kid would roll over, rub the sleep out of her eyes and start chattering happily.

Lawrence and Eloise were a whole other story. They needed their time to wake up, like their father did, and when they started preschool Toby suggested the method his mother had used on him as a child. It worked like a charm on Eloise. They would give her a morning kiss and then sit on her bed and softly rub her back for a few minutes, letting her adjust to the idea of a new day. Eventually, her eyes would open and she would grace them with that sleepy smile that made their hearts ache in the best possible way.

Lawrence, however, was completely indifferent to this tactic. They could sit there rubbing his back for hours and the kid still wouldn't budge, much to Spencer's chagrin. After trying several other things, none of which worked, she finally brought out the big guns. She kissed him like she did the girls; then opened the curtains and put his radio on full blast. It took him less than five minutes to get up that morning, and Toby congratulated her over breakfast for accomplishing the impossible.

Most of all, Spencer loved detecting the similarities and dissimilarities between herself and Toby and the children they made together. In Cleo she would recognize all her own strengths and weaknesses – the determination, the tenacity, but also the perfectionism and the pride. The day came that her first grade teacher called them into her classroom, gushed that their daughter was exceptionally bright and also very willing to help others, but that she had been matter-of-factly bragging about a certain aspect of her life that upset her classmates.

"Cleo," Spencer addressed her softly that evening, while Toby busied himself with the other two. "You can't go around telling your friends that your dad is better than their dad. That doesn't make them feel good."

The child dropped the blocks she was playing with, looking confused and just the slightest bit defensive. "But it's what _you_ said," she argued.

Spencer was genuinely puzzled, which Cleo noticeably picked up on.

"You're always saying we have the best daddy in the world," she defended herself, and Spencer didn't know whether to laugh or not because her daughter was absolutely right. She told her kids that on a regular basis, even emphasizing that they should be aware of this concept.

 _You guys know you have the best daddy in the world, right?_

She supposed it was no one's responsibility but her own that one of them had seen it fit to share this piece of information with the outside world. Smiling ruefully, she tugged on Cleo's hand and drew her into her lap, wrapping her arms around her and connecting their cheeks.

"This might be my fault," Spencer admitted with humor. "I do think you have the best daddy in the world. But we should always be mindful of other people's feelings, okay?"

"But I didn't mean to–"

"I know you didn't," Spencer interrupted soothingly, noting the slight panic in her child's eyes. "Your teacher knows that, too. We just wanted to talk to you about it, that's all."

When Spencer looked at Cleo, she would see a generally more carefree and playful version of herself. She saw her own scowl, her own disposition and, terrifyingly, her own vulnerabilities. She and Toby sensed early on that, while they might give Lawrence the occasional push to apply himself in school, it was something they should never do to Cleo. She had a thirst for knowledge that was nothing but healthy, and Spencer would rather eat her own arm than taint this by making it about grades and accomplishment.

When she looked at Eloise, all she saw was her husband. Eloise, who shied away from the spotlight, and who cried quietly when someone killed a bug. Eloise, who couldn't tell a lie to save her life.

Spencer was doing laundry one given day when she felt crumbs fall onto her hands as she made to throw her only blue-eyed child's jeans in the washing machine. Puzzled and suspicious, she searched the item until she came across a completely flattened chocolate chip cookie in one of the back pockets.

"Ellie!" Spencer called for her, very careful to keep the annoyance out of her voice because she knew this kid picked up on every subtlety. She heard light footsteps in the hall, and seconds later her daughter's blond head appeared in the doorway.

"What is this?" her mother wanted to know, holding the pocket open for the seven-year-old to view the stickiness inside. "What happened here?"

To Spencer's utter perplexity, Eloise started to cry. "I'm sorry, Mommy," she wept, wiping a hand across her eyes. "I didn't know what to do…"

Spencer immediately dropped the pants and gathered her daughter close, listening as the story fell from Eloise's mouth. The cookie was something that was snuck to her while she was at a friend's house, even though both kids knew they weren't supposed to have sweets before dinner. Faced with the impossible dilemma between what she knew was right and her unwillingness to get her friend in trouble, Eloise had found no better solution than to stuff the cookie in her back pocket and Spencer's heart squeezed because why was this child so incapable of doing anything dishonest? Why couldn't she just eat the damn cookie like a normal kid?

"I'm so proud of you," she heard herself saying as she brushed the tears away from her daughter's face. "I'm so proud of you for staying true to who you are."

Eloise calmed down at her mother's appeasing words, and Spencer held her quietly for another minute or two. She rested her chin on the child's head, pressing her lips to soft, blond hair.

"I know things aren't always easy for you. I know you sometimes feel… different." Eloise's silence confirmed Spencer's words. "You're not alone. Daddy told me he feels that way, too, sometimes. You know why?"

Eloise shook her head, and raised her blue orbs to meet her mother's dark ones. Spencer smiled lovingly. "Because he's got a gentle heart like yours."

When Spencer looked at Lawrence, she saw a complete stranger who she, contradictorily, knew like the back of her hand. Out of her three kids, he was perhaps the one that fascinated her the most. Physically, he was a Hastings – no doubt about it. But personality-wise, he had a whole bunch of quirks that neither she nor Toby had. The boy was a walking mess maker, for one. Spencer could detect where in the house he'd been just by the chaos he left behind. She and Toby had always been fairly clean people, and their daughters' room was always reasonably neat for a kids' room, but Lawrence's continuously looked like a bomb had been detonated. They would force him to clean it up, all for nothing because within twenty-four hours the room was trashed once again.

Time management was another huge issue for this boy. Getting him to put his shoes on within a five-minute time frame was a battle. Rushing him was near impossible. He was always the last in the car in the mornings, still packing his backpack and looking for his hoodie while his sisters sat, ready to go and buckled in, in their father's truck. When they came home from school both girls would look at least recognizable to the way their parents had sent them off, but Lawrence would return covered in filth if they were lucky and with ripped clothes if they weren't.

Being Lawrence's mom made Spencer want to pull her hair out on an almost daily basis but she could never blame him because at the same time, he brought her so much joy. She could count on one had the number of times this boy had ever been in a bad mood. He approached everything with a positive attitude. He loved to tease people, but he was also an incredible peacemaker. Spencer had to conclude that there wasn't a soul on earth who couldn't take an example to this kid's zest for life. In a difficult moment, she lived for Eloise's cuddles, Cleo's sense of humor and Lawrence's ear-to-ear grin.

Her absolute favorite quality in her son was one that neither she, nor Toby, nor either of their girls really possessed. Lawrence was, unmistakably, a people person. From a young age he could strike up a conversation with anyone, whether it was another kid, one of his parents' friends or the homeless man who hung around the supermarket. While Eloise hid behind her parents' legs and Cleo narrowed her eyes suspiciously at the sight of strangers of any kind, Lawrence immediately saw them as new friends.

"I've never met a person who isn't interesting," he announced over dinner one evening, causing his parents to share a bewildered look because they both knew this was a concept that didn't really apply to either of them. Throughout his developmental years, they had to warn him incessantly against talking to strangers when they, his parents, weren't around to keep an eye on him. Spencer detested the fact that they'd had to teach him to be paranoid, but the ugly truth was that their son had a natural inclination to trust everyone and it made the both of them nervous.

And still, there was a part of Spencer that couldn't help but admire this talent of his. They were out on a picnic one sunny day, and before they knew it their eight-year-old son had wandered off and started conversing with a family a few yards away. Within minutes, he was sitting with them and they were offering him some of their own lunch, waving a greeting at his parents and making gestures that their child was fine to eat with them and it didn't bother them at all.

"How does he do that?" Spencer asked in amazement, watching her son bite into a sandwich that was placed into his hands by people he didn't even know.

Toby shrugged his shoulders, giving her an incredulous look. "You're asking me? I don't even like talking to other parents at bake sales."

"True," she allowed, smiling as she passed out napkins to the two girls. "But who does he get it from?"

This time, Toby's answer was immediate. "My mom."

She looked at him in surprise, and then felt eye-opening heartache when she realized there was so much about Marion Cavanaugh that she still didn't know. She made a mental note to ask him later which of his mother's characteristics could be retraced to each of her grandchildren.

Little things about the fact that her kids were getting older jumped out at her from time to time. Otherwise trivial occurrences made it clear as day. The summer before they entered fourth grade, she and Toby took them to Disney World (it would be the first time for all five of them). In the hassle of boarding the plane and getting their hand baggage settled, the three children ended up on one side of the isle and Spencer and Toby ended up on the other. She rested her hand on his thigh, content to be sitting with him. Flying had always unnerved her a little, and after all these years her husband was still her primary source of peace and comfort.

But it was definitely bittersweet.

"This is the first time I've sat next to you on a plane in nine years," she pointed out, looking at the three kids across the isle who were talking quietly amongst themselves and getting along like angels. "They all packed their own bags. Eloise is the only one who will still hold my hand in public. I… I was so afraid of motherhood but it never occurred to me that they'd actually grow up one day. I thought they'd be little forever."

Toby chuckled and squeezed her fingers against his leg. "That's the most irrational, illogical thing I've ever heard you say."

She scowled and he chuckled again, planting a kiss on her lips. "Are you forgetting that when we checked their bags, Lawrence forgot all his underwear? There's still time, Spence. We're not redundant yet."

Smiling at him, she felt a little better. But simultaneously, she knew in her heart of hearts that it was a race against time. The babies they had created and she had carried until her body couldn't stand it anymore were slipping away, and the both of them were helpless to stop it.


	3. Chapter Three

A/N: Thank you all again for the wonderful, supportive reviews. So grateful. :)

To answer one anon reviewer's questions, Liv: I'm sorry, Melissa won't be making an appearance in this story. There was so much of Spencer and Toby's lives I wanted to cover that none of their family members really made the cut. Haha. As for parenting mistakes, I like to think they make them all the time. Little ones, and maybe a few bigger ones…?

Now. This chapter. I feel like I owe you guys a trigger warning and a big ass apology for this one. It's what my muse told me to do. I tried fighting it for a while, but she's way stronger than me and always wins in the end (and she's a huge asshole, apparenty).

* * *

 _Chapter Three: "Motherhood is the biggest gamble in the world. It is the glorious life force. It's huge and scary–it's an act of infinite optimism." – Gilda Radner  
_  
When the kids were eleven, disaster struck.

It didn't happen overnight the way some calamities do, and Toby would kick himself later for being in denial for so long. It wasn't as if he'd never seen it before, after all. It wasn't as if it hadn't also happened to another woman he loved.

He didn't consciously notice how or when it all began, but later he realized it must have been just after the holidays. Spencer went through months where it seemed she had more bad days than good. He'd catch her crying in quiet places, away from the eyes of their children, and when he wrapped her up in his arms and asked what was wrong she could never seem to give him an answer.

"Why won't you tell me?" he'd plead softly, terrified of the troubled, unhappy gleam in her eyes.

She'd simply shake her head in indecision, avoiding his gaze, and he couldn't shake the feeling that she couldn't tell him because she didn't know.

Most days, her anxiety was through the roof. She would stand by the window when one of the kids were being dropped off by carpool, on edge until everyone she loved was in her sight again. If they were even five minutes late he'd watch her fight to keep it together and then often walk away, and when he followed her he'd witness the most vicious panic attacks he'd seen her have since high school.

It happened once that he was late in coming home from work. Traffic was often a problem at that hour, and it was something he'd long gotten used to. His phone had died about two minutes into the trip, but he didn't worry too much because it wasn't that rare of an occurrence that he arrived a little later than usual. Spencer knew that, too, and he rarely phoned in for that reason unless his tardiness was extreme.

It was a massive error in judgment.

He was barely through the door before his wife came running, and when she saw him she froze. Toby saw immediately that there was something horribly wrong. The look in her eyes gave him chills. He saw betrayal, hatred, insanity – all things he never imagined he'd see when Spencer looked at him.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" she hissed, and Toby's eyes looked past her to the three children standing in the doorway behind her. Their eyes were wide and frightened and confused, and Toby's heart broke for them. Spencer never swore around her kids. She had a potty mouth when they weren't around, but in their vicinity she played the role of Good Mom and watched what she said. Toby knew his children were anything but stupid, and that they knew better than anyone that their mother using this kind of language meant she was teetering dangerously on the edge of her own self-control. The venom in her tone probably only magnified their sense of terror. The two of them had never been perfect at keeping their arguments away from their offspring, but never had they heard their parents speak to each other with this kind of hostility.

"It was just traffic," he tried explaining as calmly as he could.

"When you're late, you fucking call," she snapped shrilly, and he saw now that she was on the verge of tears.

He didn't bother explaining that his phone was dead. He had a feeling that wouldn't mean anything to her right now. "Okay," he whispered, reaching for her, wanting her in his arms, wanting that look off her face.

But she pushed him away and fled past him, disappearing up the stairs. He heard her sob right before their bedroom door closed.

Slowly, he worked up the courage to look into his children's eyes. "It's okay," he heard himself telling them. "Don't be scared."

They all rushed to him, and he opened his arms as three bodies collided with his. He didn't know what to tell them, didn't know how to explain what he himself didn't understand. So he just held them, grateful that, for now, they still all fit between his arms.

"I _told_ her you were just stuck in traffic," Cleo informed him as she pulled back a little, her face dry but tears glistening in her eyes just the same. She sniffled and Toby's heart took another hit.

"It's true," her brother confirmed, and Toby noticed that his usually vibrant eyes were somber. "She did."

Toby nodded, combing his fingers through his son's hair. Lawrence and Cleo both seemed to calm down somewhat, the stress of the past half hour falling off them. But when he looked at Eloise, he detected a very raw emotion in her wet eyes that he made his breath hitch.

Anger.

"You have to call," she told him quietly. "You can't do that to her."

"I know." He heard his own voice crack as he wiped a single tear off his daughter's cheek with his thumb. "I'm so sorry, sweet pea. It won't happen again, I promise."

His entire being tugged towards his wife's current state and he cleared his throat, forcing the practical side of his brain to take over. "Did Mom start dinner yet?"

All three of the kids shook their heads, and Toby asked, "Can you guys get the salad started for me? I need to go upstairs and make sure everything's okay."

"I know how to make Mom's pesto pasta," Cleo offered, always eager for responsibility, and he smiled at her.

"Thanks, pumpkin. That's really helpful. Get your sister to join in and Lawrence, you do the salad then, please?"

He climbed the stairs with weighty limbs, and when he opened the door to their bedroom he found her sitting on the bed with her back to him. His girl, his sweetheart, her narrow shoulders shaking and her sobs muffled.

"Spencer," he sighed heavily, sinking down next to her and slowly encircling her body with both arms. She didn't refuse him like before but she certainly didn't encourage him, either. She didn't have any reaction at all, and he told himself that the hurt he felt over this was nothing but selfish.

"Baby," he whispered, connecting his forehead with her temple. He left it there for a few seconds, then drew back, brushing her hair away from her neck as fresh tears continued to fall down her face.

"What's going on with you?" he asked painfully. "What's wrong?"

She tensed noticeably in his hold, and it was yet another non-verbal response that puzzled him. "Please don't," she finally spoke faintly, her lips barely moving.

"Don't what?" he questioned carefully, but she didn't answer. She wiped at a few tears that were almost instantly replaced with new ones, and Toby sighed and gave up waiting for her to say something he could work with. Instead, he tried to reach in her in a different way.

He pulled her closer and delicately pressed a kiss to her cheek, letting his lips linger for a long time. Then he moved his mouth upwards and did the same with her temple.

"I love you," he said softly, his voice thick with emotion. "I love you so, so much. You're the best thing–"

But before he could finish she broke free from his grasp and got to her feet, shaking her head and crying harder. "Toby, don't. You're so sweet." She said the word like it was poison. "You're so sweet and I can't stand it."

She stumbled into the adjacent bathroom as Toby sat there, aghast. Not ready to give up yet, he followed her, only to find out she'd locked the door and barricaded him from going in after her.

"Spence?" He knocked on the door, but instead of hearing her answer there was the sound of the shower turning on instead. "Spencer," he pleaded again, not knowing if she could even hear him over the noise. Miserable, he turned his back to the door and slowly slid down to the floor.

He buried his face in his hands and stayed like that for a long time. The shower was still going strong, and it was as if the sound pounded into his soul over and over. He knew it was very likely that the reason she'd even turned it on was because she wanted to drown out her sobs, and the thought alone was so intolerable that it made him want to slam his head into the wall. Spencer had always been mentally fragile in a sense, but her dismissal of his attempts to sooth her were utterly unfamiliar and it made Toby feel like the world was crumbling beneath his feet. For the first time in all the years he'd known her, he couldn't figure out what she needed. He didn't know how to make things better for her, and it made their whole relationship feel foreign and feeble.

"Dad!" Cleo's voice suddenly came from downstairs, and he startled. Was it possible that he had forgotten, for a little while, that he had kids? "I can't find the parmesan, I think we're out!"

She sounded stressed, and Toby's insides wormed with guilt. What was he thinking, putting three eleven-year-olds in charge of dinner and then leaving them to it?

It occurred to him how much simpler this would be if they didn't have children. Not easier, per se – because nothing about seeing his wife like this ever would have been easy – but simpler. Less complicated. He would be able to focus all his attention on Spencer, while now he had three kids downstairs who weren't going to raise themselves, and they shouldn't have to.

"I'm coming!" he called back, taking a deep breath and trying to compose himself. Nothing about leaving Spencer behind like this felt right. Even if it was just to go downstairs and put food in the mouths of their children.

He scribbled her a note, letting her know that they were having dinner and that he hoped she'd join them when she was ready. He couldn't stop himself from drawing her a heart. Then he slid it under the door and took a deep breath, telling himself that lingering would help neither Spencer nor the kids.

She didn't show up for dinner, and Toby was on his own trying to assure his daughter that the pasta was delicious, even after she repeatedly insisted quite unhappily that it didn't taste like Mom's. She didn't come to hug and kiss the kids before bedtime, either, missing their other daughter's silent devastation. When the kids were all asleep and Toby was finally able to check on her, he discovered her in bed with the lights out. Her eyes were closed, but he had a feeling she wasn't sleeping. He tugged the covers higher up on her shoulders anyway, and ran his hand over her hair.

In a matter of weeks, Spencer was barely leaving the bedroom. She stayed in bed most of the day, staring out in front of her blankly or catching up on the sleep she didn't manage to get at night. She ate like a bird, and weight she couldn't afford to lose fell off her like a waterfall. Going to work was out of the question – she could barely exit the room, let alone the house. Toby was leaving his own job early to pick up the kids from school now, which was something his boss allowed when Toby suggested he work through his lunch break. Still, he often arrived late anyway, finding his poor kids sitting on top of their backpacks by the school gate, looking positively glum. He would drag them to the supermarket with him, and when they got home he'd ask them to get started on their homework while he figured out what to feed them. After dinner he'd proofread essays and crack his brain over long division before rushing them to bed, nearly always feeling like he'd failed at giving them enough individual love and affection.

Worry for Spencer overrode every rational thought he had. It was with him all the time, like an ulcer waiting to erupt. He texted her constantly while he was at work and felt like he'd lose his mind when she didn't answer, which happened more and more as the weeks wore on. When he checked up on her upon arriving home, and multiple times during the evening, she nearly always feigned sleep. He brought her food that she scarcely touched. They barely spoke to each other; never touched each other. Even at night she lay as close to the edge of the bed as she seemingly could, like she wanted to avoid every form of physical contact. That was, if she even was in bed. Nighttime seemed to be her time to wander around the house, and Toby would often wake up to find her gone. Insomnia was a symptom of her illness and he understood that, but the alarm that overtook him every time this happened was something he didn't think he'd ever get used to. He often used these times as opportunities to try and talk to her, but nothing productive ever came out of it. She'd simply sit there in the dark and answer in quiet, two word sentences or not at all. When he attempted to seat himself down next to her, she tensed and turned away.

The part that hurt Toby most was not even her rejection of him, but her rejection of their children. It was hard to miss that she never left the bedroom when they were around, keeping the door shut, urging them to stay away. And in turn, Toby kept them away. Every once in a while he allowed them to go in and kiss her before school, but he stopped even that after a while. Seeing her like that only upset them, they'd ask questions he didn't know how to answer, and even though he could see Spencer make visible efforts while they were in the room with her she'd request later that he didn't to do it again.

It was gut-wrenching for him to see how deeply his kids missed their mother, and how this so acutely affected nearly every aspect of their lives. Lawrence stopped teasing his sisters overnight and grew so solemn that his father barely recognized him. Cleo was moody, complained of stomach aches and tried to validate herself by throwing herself in her schoolwork, only to have a meltdown when she received a B+ on a science quiz. Eloise withdrew to the point that Toby had to consciously ask her personalized questions just so he'd hear her voice every day, and when he'd find Cleo in her bed in the morning he knew she'd cried herself to sleep again. He half expected a phone call from their principal where the woman demanded to know what he was doing to his children, or told him they'd been acting out, or that their grades were dropping significantly. But it never happened. The school year ended, and their report cards in no way reflected the chaos and sorrow that went on in their home. Toby looked at them one evening in early summer as they were watching TV in their pajamas, all three of them close together, and it occurred to him that he hadn't heard them fight in weeks. He had a feeling that they sensed he was at the end of his rope, and that additional behavioral problems in his kids would make the fragile hold he had on keeping their lives together blow up in everyone's faces. It was perhaps unconsciously but they kept themselves in check to spare him, and although Toby was grateful he couldn't help but feel they were much too young for that kind of selflessness.

His indecision on what to do about Spencer's health escalated on a night in June when he woke up to find her missing again. Instantly, he kicked off the covers and went off in search of her, hating the way his heart still pounded. She sat perched on one of their armchairs in the blackened living room, her gaze vacant as always and he felt that now familiar stab in his gut at this lost look in her eyes. He took advantage of the fact that she hadn't noticed him yet to glance her over, and when his gaze fell down her frail body he noticed she was holding something between her hands.

"Hey," he called to her softly, against his better judgment almost. "What do you have there?"

She didn't hold it out to him, but as Toby came closer he recognized it anyway and his heart skipped a beat. It was the framed picture Aria had taken of the five of them last summer, and for once all three kids were actually looking into the camera and smiling. It was the first time in months that she was taking any interest in their family, and Toby felt his heart unexpectedly soar with hope until she looked him straight in the eye and he knew. He knew something awful was going to come out of her mouth.

She pushed the picture frame into his hands. "You should divorce me."

He barely recognized her voice. It was so stricken with grief that it nearly made his knees buckle. He couldn't even begin to react to her words because they left him empty.

"Take the kids and divorce me," she repeated, and he saw that tears were streaming down her face now. "I won't fight you for custody. No judge in their right mind would give them to me anyway."

"I don't want to divorce you." He heard himself talking but his voice sounded faint to his own ears. "I want to be with you."

She shook her head. "I don't know how to be a wife or a mom anymore. I don't know how to be anything anymore."

His legs suddenly collapsed and he sank down to the floor in front of her. The agony of what she was expressing finally hit him and for a moment it felt like he couldn't breathe. "Then let's get you help," he pleaded with her, reaching for her hand but she pulled back. She shook her head and looked away, and it defeated him because it wasn't the first time they'd broached the subject. He wished she would talk to a professional trained in depression and anxiety, but all she wanted was pills to numb her existence. Considering her history with drug abuse he had always fought the idea, but now he was so desperate that he felt his resolve falter.

"I miss you," he tried a different approach, trying to catch her eyes, yearning for her to look at him. "The kids miss you."

She went very quiet, though it didn't stop more tears from falling down her face. Her voice was unrecognizable once again. "They're better off without me. You all are. It would be easier for all of you if I was dead."

He broke out into a sweat and pulled back from her, scrambling to his feet. "No!" he barked, louder than he meant.

He breathed heavily as they regarded each other, and for the first time in weeks he had some kind of idea of what was going on in her head. They both faced the trauma of his own childhood, the experience of his own mother's mental illness and the way it had changed him when he thought she left him.

"That's not what I meant," she said quietly. "I would never do that to you."

He didn't believe her. Or he did – but he couldn't risk it. He called Emily in turmoil the next day as soon as he had a chance. Spencer was once again in bed upstairs, and through the window he watched their kids play in the front yard.

"I don't know what to do," he confessed desperately after relaying the entire story. "Maybe I should just get her the drugs she wants?"

"No," Emily interjected with no hesitation. "Toby, whatever you do, don't give her drugs."

"She's drowning, Emily!" he shouted.

"Listen to me. If you give her drugs, you'll only go from one problem into another," she countered reasonably, and he knew she was right. He could feel her falter before she asked, "Have you given any more thought to…?"

"No," he stated bluntly. "I'm not hospitalizing her. That's not going to happen."

"Toby, it wouldn't be like Radley," Emily cut in quickly. "It would be an actual hospital with people there who are trained to help her. And at least she'd be safe!"

"I can't do that do her," he admitted, blinking back tears. "I couldn't live with myself."

Emily was silent for a moment before telling him candidly, "This isn't about you. It's about her."

He pondered for a moment. Yes, there was a chance she'd never forgive him. Yes, there was a chance it would destroy something between them forever. But if that was the price he had to pay for keeping her alive and possibly getting her better, maybe it was a sacrifice he'd have to make.

"I want to be sure I've done everything I can for her first," he finally told his friend, feeling somewhat calmer.

"Toby," she sighed. "You have a full-time job. You're practically a single dad. You've spent months caring for her. What more can you possibly do?"

His wheels in his brain started to turn. Later that day he called Hanna and Caleb, Spencer's parents and eventually his boss. Then he beckoned his children into the house, sat them down across from him and prepared to have one of the most difficult conversations he would ever have in his life.

"You guys know Mom is really sick," he treaded carefully.

"She's not sick," Cleo contradicted with a slight edge to her voice. "She's just sad."

"No, honey," he woefully corrected her. "She's sick. The reason she's like this is because she has a sickness that makes her sad, but it still means she's sick. And I'm sorry," he added, looking into their pitiful little faces. "I should have talked to you about this sooner. I should have done something sooner."

He tried to bring some excitement to his voice when he informed them they would be going on a vacation with Hanna, Caleb and Rylee. When they asked where, he told them Grandma and Grandpa's lake house. When they asked how long, he hesitated.

"A few weeks," he said, knowing that this would be hard pill to swallow for his kids. Lawrence had Cleo had been to sleep away camp before but never longer than a week, and Eloise had never been away from home for more than a single night. They were already in a fragile state with everything that was going on, and Toby's predictions were spot on.

They protested, begged him to come with them and eventually all cried. He dreaded the moment he would have to send them off, giving himself repeated pep talks that it was in their best interest as well as Spencer's. They deserved some semblance of summer holiday, and in no way, shape or form did he want them around to witness the worst of their mother's illness. Or potentially watch their father have to send her away. It was something Toby had never forgiven his own father for, after all.

Hanna was his saving grace when she and Caleb came to pick the kids up a few days later. She hugged them like a mother would, had separate words of encouragement for each of them and informed them that she had a surprise for the car ride (they knew her well enough to know it would be copious amounts of junk food). Rylee, at thirteen, was loudly entering her teenage years but she hovered over his kids like a big sister, and Caleb promised to teach them how to hack a computer. Cleo, especially, looked extremely intrigued by this and Toby couldn't help but crack a smile.

They only cried a little when it was time to say goodbye, which was better than Toby expected but he felt his eyes grow moist just the same. He hugged Lawrence and then Cleo, kissed their heads and told them he loved them. He dreaded Eloise, sensing impending disaster, but she surprised him. She sniffled when he held her tightly, pushing her face into his shirt. But then she wiped her eyes and spoke sadly, quietly and only for him, with wisdom that was well beyond her years.

"It's okay, Daddy. She needs you more right now. You can't take care of everyone."

He couldn't deny that when they drove away and he waved until they were out of sight, he felt relief. Not that this in any way drowned out his guilt, just like Eloise's words didn't, but he knew beyond any shred of doubt that his children would be doted on and well cared for. He was doing this for the woman they all loved and they all couldn't live without, and he owed it to her, to their kids and to himself to do everything he could possibly think of for her.

His life over the next few days, then weeks, consisted of Spencer. He lay in bed with her while she was awake, and sat next to her reading as she slept. He went with her when she got up and sat with her wherever she wanted to be. He spent many nights sitting up with her, trying to be of some silent support. Emily delivered groceries to the house several times a week and made his wife a meal three times a day, not giving a peep when she barely looked at it and quietly finishing his own food instead even though he barely tasted it. He didn't force any conversation that she didn't want to have. In the beginning he didn't touch her, but as time went by he grew more daring and reached out to play with the ends of her hair as she rested. Gradually and only when he sensed permission, he introduced more intimacy, always while they were in bed together and he knew she was at her most vulnerable. He ran his hand up and down her back, softly, slowly, steadily. He gently massaged her shoulders. They came to a point where she allowed him to come all the way up to her and spoon her, and to kiss her forehead as he took her plate away. They were minor victories, but Toby felt like crying with joy every time his lips connected with her skin.

He permitted himself a run every morning, simply to get rid of all his pent up energy and frustration. He never stayed away for longer than thirty minutes because that was all he felt comfortable leaving her alone for, but he needed the exercise to clear head and to restore his sanity. He would feel alive as his heart pumped and music blasted in his ears. He appreciated fresh air in a way that he never had before, and it gave him hope to return to the house and to the woman he loved so fiercely, thinking maybe today would be the day that she opened up and talked to him.

He FaceTimed the kids every evening as promised, listening to them ramble about their day and feeling optimistic that they were doing as well as the circumstances would allow. Hanna sent him updates and pictures during different intervals of every day – Lawrence floating on a pool mattress, Cleo trying out a handstand in the sand, Eloise enjoying a popsicle, Lawrence playing table tennis with Caleb in the back yard of the house, Cleo and Rylee sporting matching sunglasses and duck faces, Eloise wrapped in a towel and Hanna's arms, and his personal favorite: his three angels all together, their arms around each other's shoulders and big, silly grins on their faces with the lake in the background.

Unsurprisingly, they had difficult moments that Hanna reported, as well. Moments where they went quiet and missed their parents and wanted to go home, but overall Toby could see that their holiday was going them a world of good and he couldn't be more grateful to have friends who put their own lives on hold to watch over his children like their own.

Two and a half weeks into the four-week period he had foreseen to try and get their lives back on track, there came a turning point. If Toby was honest with himself, he was starting to despair. He realized things wouldn't change overnight but their time together was nearing its end, and if there was still no change in her by the end of the week he knew he would have to look into taking the steps he'd sworn he never would. He abhorred it, and he abhorred himself for it – but the only thing he really knew for sure was that he couldn't do nothing but watch her slip away anymore, he couldn't return to work and fear for her wellbeing every second of every day, and he couldn't allow his kids to come back to a home where they were forced to grow up much faster than they should. There came a point where hesitance and indecisiveness did more harm than good.

He lay in bed with her one quiet afternoon, his arms wrapped around her from behind and his nose buried into her shoulder. His legs followed the curve of hers and their bare feet were intertwined. He closed his eyes and took in her scent, thinking that these cuddles she allowed now were the most treasured parts of his life at the moment. He couldn't help but think that if this was all that came out of their four weeks together, it would still be worth it. Just being near her like this calmed the storm in his head, brought him peace, gave him hope – which was why he felt alarm course through his veins when she suddenly let out a rough, noisy sob.

He reflexively tightened his hold on her. She cried all the time, often without an obvious reason, but ever since her illness even began to get out of hand it had always been hushed tears and not the louder, messier version of crying that he heard now. Before he could say anything, she carefully broke loose from his grasp and sat up in the bed, wrapping her arms around her knees and folding herself into a ball as if she wanted to make herself as small as she possibly could. He followed and perched himself up next to her, running his hand down her back as he took a close look at her face.

He didn't know what possessed him to ask. He'd asked so many times before, after all, only to be evaded, and he'd promised himself he wouldn't push her anymore. But now he took a leap of faith, and questioned softly, "What is it?"

She took a deep breath and to his utter surprise, she answered.

"You know what I hate most about myself?" She didn't give him the chance to respond. "I have _no reason_ to be like this. No reason to feel so _fucking_ miserable all the time. I have…" Her voice trembled and fresh tears came to her eyes. "I have the three most beautiful and amazing kids in the world. I have the most wonderful, most loving husband who's been my safe place to land for as long as I can remember. I'm not being bullied and tortured every day of my life anymore. I have everything I didn't dare dream of as a kid and everything I thought I'd never have. I have every reason to be happy, and I'm not."

"Spencer," he said calmly, even though his heart was pounding. "This is a chemical imbalance in your brain. Maybe something from your past triggered it, or maybe it's just something that happened spontaneously but whatever it is, it's not you being ungrateful."

He saw her swallow and lower her eyes, her words hesitant. "It feels like my fault."

"Well, it's not. Honey…" He brushed her hair away from her face and held back his own tears. "It's not."

"I've been too embarrassed to seek help," she admitted, sounding small and defeated. "Even from you. I… I think I thought I didn't deserve it."

Her words stung him like a bee but they didn't surprise him. There was her mental illness, and then there was the fact that the way she'd dealt with it was incredibly self-destructive and self-loathing. "Let me make an appointment for you," he pleaded just as quietly. "I'll go with you if you want, hold your hand… anything. Just please don't ask me to stand by and watch you go through this alone anymore."

She nodded and her face crumpled, suddenly crying again. "I hate myself for doing that to you. And the kids… Oh God, what have I done to my kids?"

"It's going to be okay," he promised, gathering her in his arms and burying his lips in her hair. He slowly swayed her back and forth, the same way he had with their children when they were younger and scraped their knees. His voice was soft and delicate. "All they need is for you to get better. That's all any of us need. You're the heart of this family, Spence." He pressed his lips to her hair again and stopped moving so his words were sure to sink in. "You think it's me but it's not. It's you."

Languidly, she turned her body all the way into him and he felt her hands slide around his torso. If he thought her lying passively in his arms was an amazing feeling, it was nothing compared to her connecting their figures like this, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and burying her face in his neck. He held her close and let his eyes fall shut in pleasure, hardly daring to believe it. Only now did he let himself feel deep within his core how intensely he'd longed for her affections – her hugs, her hand in his, her fingers sifting through his hair as they sat on the couch, her lips brushing against his bare back while he shaved and the unrushed, feathery kisses she coated his face in when he had a hard time opening his eyes in the mornings. All things he needed like the air he breathed, and hadn't let himself truly feel the absence of because it would have incapacitated him.

"I love you," he choked out, kissing her shoulder and her neck. He was halfway terrified because the last time he told her that she'd pulled away and locked him out, but he couldn't stop himself. "You know that, right?"

She did the opposite of what he'd feared, and the opposite of how she'd reacted last time. She pushed herself closer still, and he smiled a shaky smile when he realized that he didn't need any kind of verbal confirmation.

If there was anything that the past few weeks had taught him, it was that actions really did speak louder than words.


	4. Chapter Four

A/N: I sound like a broken record, no doubt, but thank you again for the encouraging reviews. When people tell me they cried at something I wrote, I always feel this really bizarre mixture of flattery and remorse. I'm sorry? I'm grateful you stayed with me despite the heartache, and that you didn't hate me for the last chapter because I sort of hated myself at times, to be honest. LOL.

Last chapter! I had fun here, guys. Hope you did, too. Peace out.

* * *

 _Chapter Four: "Grown don't mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child. They get bigger, older, but grown? In my heart it don't mean a thing." – Toni Morrison  
_  
"Baby steps," Toby reminded her every time she felt overwhelmed, despondent or like she was going crazy. And gradually – sometimes in leaps and bounds, and sometimes agonizingly slowly – things got better.

He started by simply asking her to come on his morning runs with him. It seemed impossible at first, seeing as she hadn't left the house in months and the mere thought gave her crippling anxiety, but he convinced her by promising they'd just run around the block and then go back home. She trembled, panicked and nearly threw up, but she made it and he hugged her and it left her feeling like she'd actually accomplished something. It took her a few days to realize that the exercise did wonders for her confidence, and that getting up and putting workout clothes on gave her purpose without feeling like the task ahead of her was too daunting. The sunlight on her face soothed her and the exertion bumped up her appetite. Every morning it still scared her to step over the threshold of the front door, but Toby would offer his hand and his kind eyes convinced her again and again. It didn't take long for her to start craving longer runs, yearning for the energy boost and that sense of triumph she experienced afterwards. In these moments, she remembered what happiness felt like.

Facing the demons in her head was perhaps the most terrifying ordeal of her life – and that was saying something. Sitting across from a trained professional whose eyes bore into her and forced her to relive things she'd long repressed seemed inhumane at times. She dreaded the confrontation, the exhaustion, the betraying tears that came almost every time. The practice of having to bare her soul over and over again almost felt like a violation, and it was more than she'd bargained for. But steadily, the hill she had to climb over each and every session became smaller and flatter. The shame she felt lessened when he realized this woman wasn't there to judge her. One by one, the puzzle pieces fell into place. She came to realize many different issues had factored in to her illness, most of it unconscious on her part. Talking about it and looking deep into herself made her realize that it was likely a combination of the childhood trauma she'd never fully dealt with, and the fact that her own children were nearing the age where it all went wrong for her. The idea of them entering those terrifying teenage years where they stopped confiding in her and suffered in silence made her feel useless and out of control, along with the thought that anyone could harm them the way she'd been harmed and Toby had been harmed.

Her number one priority besides getting herself healthy again was rebuilding her relationships with the people she loved most in the world. Lucky for her, she had a husband who made it so easy for her to find him again. He was always there to offer tranquil support, whether that meant listening when she needed to get something off her chest or holding her during a difficult moment when her dark thoughts resurfaced and it felt like she hadn't made any progress at all. He drove her to all her therapy appointments for as long as driving still seemed like something she'd never do again because it caused her so much distress that she lacked the trust in herself to think she could handle it. Doing the simplest things with him, like cooking or gardening or cleaning the bathroom together, brought her unparalleled serenity and a sense of normalcy that made her kick herself for shutting him out for so long. Even though she understood now that it had been one of her methods for punishing herself, it took a long, long time for her to come to terms with the fact that her illness never would have escalated to the point that she could no longer see a happy future for her family as long as she was a part of it, if she'd just taken refuge in his very open arms from the beginning.

They slept in embraces so tight that she doubted she even needed blankets to keep her warm, and they kissed like teenagers. It almost felt like falling in love with him all over again, but then she would remember that she'd never actually fallen out of love with him in the first place, and it was actually falling in love with _life_ all over again. He made her love life in a way that no one else could.

It wasn't until months of growing intimacy and dozens of therapy sessions had passed that she finally found herself wanting more than just those steamy, soulful kisses that made her toes curl. It happened after an ordinary day – which, by now, meant getting up and fixing breakfast, going on her run after Toby took the kids to school, going grocery shopping, heading to therapy, picking the kids up afterwards and getting started on dinner while waiting for Toby to get home. She didn't feel quite ready to return to work yet, but other than that she had a pretty good grasp on her life these days. It was hard to believe that only a few months ago she barely got out of bed.

She watched Toby in the bathroom, wearing only his boxers as he finished brushing his teeth and dried his face with a towel. She saw his muscles flex and felt that familiar twinge of desire in her lower belly, and unlike in the past few weeks she couldn't quench it down.

Her feet walked her up to him and her hands roamed across his bare upper body tentatively, her eyes following their journey. Her mouth came soon after, slowly pressing kisses against his chest, neck and shoulders. When her fingertips dipped beneath the waste line of is boxers, he suddenly moved his arms all the way around her and gently pulled her against his body.

"Are you sure?" he murmured into her hair. "We don't have to do this tonight. We don't have to until you're ready."

She smiled into his warm skin because not only did his words make her feel safe and loved, they also made her realize she wasn't alone. She wasn't the only one still fighting her demons, and maybe that was okay. He was a sexual abuse survivor and she was a trauma survivor and a drug addict, but maybe that didn't necessarily mean they were broken. Maybe it just made them more compassionate.

She lifted her head from his chest and brushed her lips across his jaw. "What you just said only makes me want you more."

His fingers tipped her face towards him so he could catch her eyes. He looked over every part of her, and Spencer's mind flashed back to when they were teenagers and first talked about sex. He had told her in no uncertain terms that it had absolutely no appeal to him if she didn't want it. Clearly, he still felt that way over two decades later.

Apparently satisfied, he lifted her off her feet and lazily walked them towards the bed. "We can stop anytime you want," he promised softly, laying her down and hovering over her. "Just say the word and we'll cuddle instead, okay?"

She lifted her head and caught his lips with hers. What came next was a blur of sloppy kisses and leisurely caresses that left her breathless. Their touches had a silky kind of timidity about them that hadn't been there since their very first time, but the trust between them prevented it from being awkward or hesitant or uncomfortable. He was the only lover she had ever known. He would always feel familiar to her – fifty years could go by where they didn't touch each other and she knew she'd still recognize him even with her eyes closed. The broad shoulders and strong arms and muscled stomach; the big hands and long fingers that could easily squeeze the life out of her if he decided to use his physical strength against her but had never been anything but soft and gentle. The full lips that connected with hers and with her neck and breasts and the inside of her thighs. The tender, encouraging whispers against her ear that her brain was too muddled to make sense out of but somehow still comforted her anyway.

It didn't go entirely the way it usually did. He came before her – undoubtedly the result of a dry spell that, if she was honest, she didn't even know how longevity of because she couldn't remember when the last time was that they did this. All she knew was that it was months and months ago, long before the worst of her illness ever hit.

Even though he made sure to finish her off, she could tell he was embarrassed.

"Sorry," he mumbled, making his way back up her body, and she reached for his head and pulled him to her.

"It's okay," she whispered, raking her fingers through his hair and kissing his forehead and his eyelids in the aftermath of passion.

"This wasn't the way I wanted our–"

"Toby," she interrupted in a low voice, wanting to reiterate just how much it _did not matter_. "It was perfect."

They folded together and lay in the quiet, allowing their heartbeats to come back down to normal. Her hand traveled his chest, his nipples, his stomach, his arms, his shoulders, his face, his hair and even his ears. Her voice was heavy when she asked, "Did you ever doubt it? How much I…" She swallowed. "How much I love you?"

It was a long time before he spoke, but when he did his answer was simple. "No. I knew it wasn't about that."

She wanted to tell him how he'd saved her – again. How if not for him, she wasn't sure she'd still be alive, but he didn't give her the chance. He smiled at her with adoration in his eyes and pressed his lips against hers. They would make love more than once that night, and in the morning Spencer longingly kissed him goodbye and wondered how both her mental health and her marriage had come out of this stronger than ever before.

When she first pulled out of the numb existence she'd banished herself into, she'd been almost certain that she'd damaged her relationship with her children forever. Even if they forgave for her for basically checking out for months on end, and even if they had the miraculous maturity to realize it was the result of a hereditary illness rather than laziness or lack of interest, she couldn't imagine they'd ever trust her again. In the beginning, she didn't even trust herself.

The kids came home from their vacation with Hanna and Caleb while Spencer was still at the starting point of her recovery. She'd hung back when Toby FaceTimed them every evening, her heart bleeding when she heard each of their voices from the next room but feeling unequipped and unprepared to face them. In a brave moment she'd asked Toby to show her a picture, and seeing their smiling faces with the lake in the background had brought an onslaught of tears that left her shattered. She honestly didn't know how she would react to seeing them in the flesh, and didn't know till the moment they walked through the door with Toby on their heels.

They were chattering amongst each other and telling their father random details about their holiday when they spotted her, Eloise first and then Lawrence and Cleo not long after. Their skin was tan and their hair was bleached from the sun. They were all half a foot taller than Spencer remembered, and it made her want to weep at the time she'd lost. She swallowed the lump in her throat as they hesitated, looking to their father for what to do.

"What are you waiting for?" His voice was mellow and he smiled with gentle encouragement. "Go give her a hug."

Lawrence shot into action first, nearly knocking Cleo over and throwing his arms around his mother with so much conviction that she stumbled backwards. The girls came running fractions of seconds later, and soon her arms were filled with the three little people she'd lay down her life for. They cried, she cried – it was a mess but it was the most beautiful mess she'd ever been a part of and she held her arm out to Toby because she wanted him be a part of it, too.

They had a long talk with their kids that same night, and Spencer was as honest with them as she could possibly be. "I'm still having a hard time," she admitted, hating the anguish in their faces, "but I promise that I'm doing everything I can to get better. I promise I'm never giving up, and I promise I'm not closing my door anymore because I miss you guys too much."

"But why did you do that?" Lawrence wanted to know, and she struggled to explain.

"I… I thought I was protecting you. I didn't want you seeing me like that. It had nothing to do with how much I love you," she added desperately, and when she saw Cleo look at Toby anxiously she added, "Or how much I love your father. It was a big mistake, I'm so sorry and I promise I'll never do it again."

She was prepared for the fact that her words probably sounded empty, and that her kids weren't going to believe her straight away. She was knocked off her socks when Lawrence came to her barely twenty-four hours later, gave her a big hug and said, "I love you, Mom. I'm glad you're back."

She clutched him to her, kissed his forehead and felt her heart turn into a puddle when he pulled back to give her one of those shit-eating grins that she could only associate with him. She couldn't grasp the concept that, with her son at least, it had all been so uncomplicated, and for quite a while she waited anxiously for the other shoe to drop.

It never did.

Eloise followed her like a shadow for a few days upon her return, always close but never close enough for Spencer to reach out to touch or kiss her. Not wanting to force her daughter into conversations she wasn't ready to have, Spencer only offered what she hoped were reassuring smiles but it wasn't very long before the exposed look in Eloise's eyes broke down her resolve.

"Did you want to ask me something, honey?" she finally questioned softly, while Toby was running an errand and the other two kids had opted to go with him.

Eloise shook her head vigorously, then rushed forward and collapsed in her mother's arms. "Mommy," she managed through her tears, and Spencer's eyes instantly watered, too.

It took her roughly three seconds to realize this child didn't want to talk. She wanted to be held. She wanted to be physically comforted, so Spencer sank down to the kitchen floor and rocked her almost twelve-year-old in her arms like a baby. Eloise would remain glued to her side for another few weeks, which was something Spencer selfishly didn't mind. If this was what she needed to heal then her mother would gladly offer cuddles and snuggles for as long as she would allow them, and when she started to regain her independence little by little Spencer knew it was for the best but she also found herself hopelessly missing her daughter's proximity.

Still, Lawrence and Eloise's acceptance had happened so much more smoothly than she anticipated, and with no resentment. When she felt they were ready, she took them each to a therapy session with her, just so they'd have a voice and a sanctuary if they wanted to share something they couldn't find the words for at home. Even though it was unspeakably difficult, she listened to what their lives had looked like during in months she'd been in bed. She was amazed at how articulate they were, feeling certain that at their age she was nowhere near as capable of expressing herself. Afterwards she took them each out for ice cream, and came home feeling like things would actually be alright and maybe she hadn't screwed them up for life after all.

Cleo was the one who remained closed off and distrusting. It wasn't anything too obvious – she certainly wasn't rude or blatantly ignored her mother or did anything that was purposely hurtful – but she never talked about what happened and seemed to want to avoid being alone with Spencer at all costs. She'd always been a Daddy's girl, but now she turned to her father for absolutely everything and even though Spencer understood her reasons and would never begrudge Toby his relationship with her, she couldn't pretend it didn't hurt. And as hard as it was for her, it seemed almost harder for Toby. He noticed the tension between his wife and daughter and, being Toby, desperately tried to fix it.

"You can't force her to get past something she's not ready to get past," she told him quietly, one evening when the kids were in bed. She was guessing he'd noticed how Cleo had kept her eyes closed when Spencer went to kiss her goodnight, even though she'd been wide awake barely a minute earlier when Toby went in.

"I just…" His shoulders slumped. "I don't understand why she's doing this."

"I do," she said, almost humorously, because that was the part that made this whole thing so ironic. "Trust doesn't come as easily to some of us. She needs time, Toby. Please don't rush her."

It got better as the weeks went by and summer vacation ended. Cleo asked her mother to curl her hair for the first day of middle school, and Spencer nearly cried with gratitude. She asked for advice on what classes to take and which clothes to wear. She no longer waited for Spencer to sit down first for movie night, just so she could dodge ending up next to her. She no longer tensed or made herself boneless like a ragdoll when her mother tried to hug her.

Yet, sometimes Spencer could still feel it, almost unnoticeably. That distance between them that never used to be there, and that she would never and could never accept as the norm.

It changed on a sunny Saturday in late September, when the two of them were in the back yard pulling out weeds. Spencer had discovered that mindless tasks like this helped keep her mind straight, and that the outdoors actually relieved her anxiety instead of adding to it. Toby was away with Lawrence at soccer practice, Eloise was inside curled up with a book, and Cleo had appeared seemingly out of nowhere and wordlessly started helping her mother in the garden. Spencer sensed there was a lot on her mind but she didn't push, and the two worked together side by side but mostly in silence.

"Am I going to get it?" Cleo suddenly asked in a small voice. "The sickness that makes people sad?"

Spencer's hands stopped moving and she took a second to collect herself before looking at her child. "Where's this coming from?"

"My whole life everyone's always told me I'm exactly like you," she struggled to reply, and there was a naked vulnerability in her eyes that touched her mother's every nerve.

"You are not limited to the things I've done, or the mistakes I've made. Your life is not constricted to what I've done with mine," Spencer told her, holding her gaze so there would be no misunderstandings. After that, her voice went softer. "Your personality is a lot like mine but that doesn't mean we're the same person."

"But will I get it?" she repeated, and Spencer swallowed. Hard.

"I don't know, baby," she confessed truthfully, thinking back to the nightmare-ridden little girl Cleo used to be. "I can't predict your future, and I'm not going to lie to you, okay? There's always a chance you might get it someday. There's also a chance your brother or sister might get it someday. It's not for sure so don't think you're predestined, but it's possible. But listen to me – _listen_ ," she repeated when she saw her daughter's eyes fill with tears. "It's really important that you know that _if_ you do, it's not your fault."

It took saying it like that, point blank, for the truth of her words to sink in for herself. It took knowing how wholly and fully and unconditionally she'd want her children to forgive themselves for her to finally accept that she deserved forgiveness, too.

"And _if_ you do, don't handle it like me, okay?" Spencer smiled ruefully through her blurry vision and brushed her fingers along her daughter's cheek. "Don't push away the people who want to show you the light at the end of the tunnel. Don't forget that you deserve to be loved. Because you do, and you are. Cleo Cavanaugh, you are so incredibly loved."

Cleo scooted closer, and her mother wrapped her arms around her as they both let a few tears fall. Spencer held her daughter tight, but she felt her heart swell as she realized that the last of her babies had come back to her. Maybe in a few weeks this one could join her in therapy, too, and share her concerns there. If there was anything Spencer had learned from this ordeal, it was that she and Toby needed to arm their children with as many tools as possible to voice their feelings in a healthy way.

"I'm so glad we had this talk, pumpkin," she said, causing Cleo to sit up and smile even though there was still a remaining tear in the corner of her eye.

"Mom," she complained with a slight eye roll. "I'm almost twelve. You can't call me that anymore."

And Spencer laughed despite the dagger in her heart. "Dream on. You'll always be my pumpkin."

"Fine," Cleo sighed, but Spencer could detect that underneath it all she was pleased to hear that. "Just… not at school, okay?"

"Deal," her mother agreed, pushing Cleo's dark hair behind her ears with both hands and feeling the lightest she had in almost a year.

By the time the kids turned thirteen and officially entered adolescence, Spencer was mentally stronger than she'd ever been in her life. She was still seeing her therapist once and week and didn't plan to give it up anytime soon, wanting to make her health a priority for her family's sake as well as her own. She and Toby were thick as thieves, and all three kids were excelling in middle school. She was back to work and back to thriving in her career. Bad days were a very rare occurrence now, and nothing a hug from Toby couldn't fix.

It was still scary for her to watch her kids grow older. Cleo got her period at thirteen, Eloise five months later, and Spencer and Toby both had to adjust to the fact that they were technically women now. It made her happy and sad at the same time, missing her little girls but so incredibly proud of the young adults they were turning into. Mostly, she was just grateful she was so longer in bed upstairs, missing these times with them and forcing Toby to take on the role of their mother. Which he'd done better than any man she knew, Spencer wholeheartedly admitted. But when her girls bled for the first time, she had never been more relieved that her husband wasn't on his own. She was thankful that their daughters weren't forced to go through it without her, and Spencer wouldn't have wanted to miss it for anything in the world.

Lawrence went through his voice change, and just like that he sounded like a man. Spencer played the video that she'd taken of him sitting in her car just a few weeks before, unashamedly singing along to the radio in his baby voice, over and over until it drove the whole family crazy. Fifteen years ago, she never would have thought she'd ever be _that_ mom.

It wasn't long before high school was around the corner, and with it came a whole new set of worries. Sex, drugs, mind games, anonymous stalkers, predatory teachers – Spencer worried about all of it, but it didn't mess with her mental health the way it once might have. Worrying was normal, both Toby and her therapist assured her. Everyone did it. What mattered was how she dealt with it, and they both promised her she was handling it just fine.

She and Toby both kept their kids as close as they would allow it, talking to them about various issues and doing their best to keep the lines of communication open. It wasn't always easy when two out of the three kids were social butterflies who were never home and only their blond sister could be found in the house, usually by the fireplace with a book and a cup of tea or an apple – but they tried. They enforced the No Phone At The Table rule, ignoring their kids' slight grumblings and using it as a time every day to enjoy each other's companionship and to check in on their children's emotional wellbeing. They extensively discussed sex and consent with the kids, separately as well as together, emphasizing not only the importance of feeling ready for the right reasons, but also making sure their partner was equally ready and not putting any kind of pressure on them. Perhaps most importantly, they made it a point to be unconditionally supportive of any interests or hobbies their children chose for themselves.

Lawrence was quite the athlete. He was on half the sports teams in the school, juggled multiple AP classes per semester and still managed to get straight A's. How, Spencer didn't know, because she barely saw him open his books except over breakfast, looking over his notes while he shoveled his food into his mouth and making his mother shake her head in a bizarre mixture of amusement and dismay. Cleo followed in Spencer's footsteps. She was president of the debate team, which was more successful under her lead than it had been in a decade. She also played chess competitively and, though Spencer had never forced this, decided field hockey was her sport. Every semester, without fail, her parents would have to convince her to go for one less AP class than she had planned, always a little worried that her Hastings genes might kick in and she would spread herself too thin. Eloise was the star of the track team, though she cringed when anyone called her that (which her brother easily picked up on and mercilessly used to his advantage). She had long legs that were built for sprinting, and easily outran anyone in the county. She was one of the quiet artsy kids who gave most people a rude awakening when they learned of how many AP classes she took, and how knowledgeable she was when she felt comfortable enough to open her mouth.

With high school came romance, though Spencer was relieved to discover that her kids didn't seem all that prone to serious relationships the way she and her friends had been at that age. When they were sixteen it hit her that they were the very same age as she had been when she first walked up to Toby's doorstep all those years ago, and it silenced her for a while. She mentioned it to her husband as they lay in bed that night, and she could tell by his responding groan that the thought had occurred to him before, too.

"Don't remind me," he muttered, rubbing his face. "How did I never realize we were that young?"

She smiled ruefully at him and asked, "Am I a hypocrite for not wanting them to get involved so seriously when anyone right now?"

"If you are then I am, too," he told her without shame, reaching for her and pulling her against him in the dark.

Lawrence had a few steady girlfriends but none that stuck, and when Spencer ran into their mothers they always gushed about what a nice boy he was and how disappointed they were when he stopped coming around. Cleo dated boys, then dated girls, and then decided she liked both. Eloise seemed utterly uninterested in the dating scene at all, until she was a senior and finally noticed one of the many boys that came knocking at the door for her.

Spencer felt like she needed to pinch herself when she was touring college campuses. It seemed like only yesterday that she was wiping runny noses and picking up Duplo. When the kids had started kindergarten, she and Toby and opted to put them all in separate classes to stimulate their independence and connections with other children. It had taken her until Christmas to feel truly confident about their choice, mostly because separating Eloise from her sister had seemed like an unnecessarily harsh thing to do at times. But now, as she watched her three kids pick completely different colleges with different trivia and in different areas, it only affirmed they'd made the right call all those years ago. They were triplets – they'd shared a womb and a life and nearly all their milestones, and they had a bond that trumped anything Spencer had ever seen, but they were separate people. They would miss each other and likely regret their decision to go their separate ways more than once, especially the girls, but this time Spencer had no doubt that they would be better for it. She also had a very strong feeling they would come back together as full-grown adults in the end.

Cleo's school started first. She was excited, and both her parents knew she was eighteen going on thirty-eight and that she had been ready for this kind of freedom for years now. In a way it made things easier, but it didn't make it any less devastating.

"Don't push yourself too hard," Toby gently chastised her. "Remember to look at the birds from time to time."

"And don't be afraid to reach out if you need anything," Spencer added, rubbing her daughter's arm for extra emphasis. "Even if it's just to talk, or even if you feel like you messed up. _Especially_ if you feel like you messed up. We're not as far away as you think."

When they walked away without their child and settled in the car, Toby turned to her with tears in his eyes and gruffly spoke the words that remained stuck in her own throat.

"I can't believe we're going to have to do that twice more this week."

She reached for his hand and didn't let go the whole way home.

Eloise was next, and Spencer was selfishly thankful that she wasn't the last to leave the nest because she didn't know how she would have coped. This child had always been her biggest source of worry, and this time was no different. She was eighteen now, but still crawled in bed with her parents on most Sunday mornings. She still sat on her father's lap from time to time, and didn't seem to mind when her mother kissed her in front of her friends and teachers on the school premises. It wasn't that Spencer didn't think she could handle being out on her own – it was that she was terrified that the cruel world that Eloise lived in would punish her lack of corruption.

"Can we FaceTime?" their daughter asked, looking around her new dorm room uncertainly.

"Yes," Spencer assured her without hesitation, fighting to keep the wide range of emotions out of her voice. "Every day, for as long as you want."

"And if you need a break from civilization just let me know and I'll come up to get you for the weekend, okay?" Toby chimed in.

"Dad, it's a three hour drive," she told him, like he didn't already know.

"Doesn't matter," he promised, kissing her forehead before repeating, "Just let me know."

Deep down, Spencer knew that Eloise would adjust better than she thought and better than her parents expected. History had already proven her more than capable. Her parents had worried for all her transitions: preschool, kindergarten, first grade, middle school and high school. All of it, and she had surprised them every time. So, as much as it destroyed Spencer to leave behind a kid that didn't really want to be left behind, she knew her child and she knew in her gut that Eloise would find her place here just like she always had before.

Lawrence was last, which made him the hardest to leave behind by default, but also, in a way, the easiest. Within an hour of arriving in his building, he knew everyone by name and was joking around with them like they'd been friends his entire life.

"You're not going to miss us at all, are you?" Spencer said disapprovingly, only half joking. He laughed.

"Sure I am," he promised her, throwing an arm around each of his parents and pulling them both in for a bear hug. "You guys are the best parents in the world."

They hardly felt like the best parents in the world that night as they sat on their couch and got really drunk. And it was not a happy kind of drunk. She rested her head against her husband's chest, his fingers toying with her hair and generously pouring red wine as soon as either of their glasses even threatened to run out. It scared her how quiet the house was when they didn't exchange words.

They woke up the next day with searing headaches, and cursed themselves since they both had work. Toby offered to make them coffee and omelets, and she nodded appreciatively as she swallowed down some Aspirin. He was at the stove when she entered the kitchen, her hair done her and her outfit spotless even though she still felt like her scull had only barely survived a train wreck. Absentmindedly she started setting the table, only to freeze halfway when she realized what she was doing.

She'd set out five plates and five glasses, and had placed down two knives and was holding three more in her hand.

She looked at Toby in confused disruption and he offered her a sad, sympathetic smile when he saw the table. They had gone from being a family of two to a family of five literally overnight without any major transitional issues, even with her being so skeptical about the whole thing – so how was it that switching back to a family of two was infinitely and boundlessly more difficult?

They shared a quiet breakfast together, and Spencer had to admit it was nice. She covered his hand with hers as they quietly sipped their coffee, taking the time to just sit back and adjust to the idea that it was just the two of them now. And as Spencer looked into her husband's beautiful aging face and still brilliantly blue eyes, it occurred to her that the company she was left with could be a lot worse.

"I made reservations for tonight at that Italian place you like," he told her. "And I thought maybe this weekend we could drive down to the lake? We're finally alone after eighteen years, we need to make the most of it."

Spencer laughed in spite of herself. "That's one way to look at it," she conceded, still smiling at him from across the table. One of her very favorite things about Toby was that he didn't wallow in his misery the way she did.

He left for work earlier than her today, and came to her as she finished up in the kitchen.

"Have a good day, okay?" he said softly, grazing her jaw with his fingertips. She smiled and nodded, reaching up to hold his wrist and stroke the back of his hand with her thumb.

He kissed her, and it was one of those full body kisses that took her back thirty years to when they were young and the world was at their feet. Their kiss evolved into a hug the way it usually did, and as she clung to him the thought struck her that, yes, her children were gone. She and Toby could never go back to being a family of two because that wasn't the way the universe worked. Their kids were a part of them. They always would be, and they would probably always miss them ferociously.

But the foundation of their family was still here in this embrace, the two of them entwined. Their kids would spread their wings, as they should, but Toby would always be with her.

"I love you," she murmured, kissing his chin, "and I'll miss you all day."

He smiled, brushing their noses together in that way that still made her stomach flutter. "Same."

Her eyes didn't leave him until he was through the door and out of sight, and she found herself looking forward to tonight and to the weekend.


End file.
